#meta: travis.

[itchose]

☺:  three things that make my muse happy / travis. You know I had to. Thanks.

incredibly difficult question to answer because mostly anything that has the ability to make him happy also comes with some very deep sadness or regret but since you asked.. <3

nat makes him happy. nat also makes him incredibly sad and after those first 5-7 months in the wilderness, a lot of the comfort they found in each other is very soured by what they lose together. i stand by the actor's claim that travis doesn't know what happened with nat and javi specifically in their final moments, because i don't think he could ever truly get past that, but he obviously knows something happened, is afraid to know exactly what, and it's constantly there, lingering between them, weighing on them, because they know they haven't told each other everything. and they know they don't know how to talk about it. but it's a push and pull because they don't know how to be with each other but they also don't know how to be without each other. travis genuinely loves nat, but as they grow up, they keep hurting each other, they keep bringing out the worst in each other, and he's constantly faced with the fact that they shouldn't be together. but every time they cut each other off, they just get lonelier, they lose themselves even more. nat makes him happy as a teenager + an adult; as a teenager, she's the one who has the ability to break through his hard shell + his desperate attempts to hide his real emotions and not give away too much of himself. she gives him the ability to smile and laugh and feel normal the way he barely has ever felt in his life. there's just such a deep sadness to it all too that never really fades from their life together.

talking about @manslaught here too because their dynamic is well developed, but mikayla also makes him happy - in a similar way as nat, in which there's happiness, but also deep sadness and regret. their friendship stems from her forming a connection with javi and javi gravitating towards her. this was especially true towards the end of javi's life, but travis noticed it as early as the plane ride, too. he knew javi saw her as a friend and even though mikayla was the kind of person travis desperately wanted to steer clear of in high school, she instantly became important to him once javi died. they didn't really get to know each other until after they were rescued and travis visited her in prison, with the claim that javi would have wanted him to but really, he wanted to, because he was lost and there was a certain kind of security in having mikayla in his life. he and his mother don't know how to be around each other, he and nat cling to each other but are also a mess, but mikayla is really the only stability he has in his life for years to come. she and nat are the only family he really feels like he has; she's like a sister to him, and once he realizes that, he does everything in his power to try to keep her safe, because he failed at being a brother with javi and he failed at protecting him, so it's so crucial to him that mikayla has someone she can count on. travis still doesn't have a lot of moments of genuine happiness, but when he does, they're often with her. she helps him relax and when he can tell he's helping her too, it's really refreshing for him.

in the wilderness, it makes him happy when they find game. obviously they're always desperate for it, even when there is game around to hunt, but in those first few months, he felt really proud every time they could come back with something. he's always felt like an outsider, but it's heavily emphasized in the wilderness because he's the only teenage boy amongst a bunch of his peers who likely never gave him the time of day before. he feels uncomfortable, awkward, and constantly on edge around all of them, but when he gets to feel like he's doing something beneficial to all of them, something that only he and nat are doing at that point, it gives him a sense of purpose and makes him feel like he's not just a burden to them all. and in general it just feels really good for him to accomplish something and to be good at it.

[pintsofguinnesmakeyoustrong]

and to think that this all happened because laura lee called her piano teacher a cunt

[nataliesscatorccio]

Dead cabin guy and his technicolor dreamcoat have haunted me since the wardrobe reveal in season two, and today im going to make it everyone's problem.

Travis wears the coat first. He and Natalie take the blessing and go out to look for Javi. Travis hallucinates (prophesies?) that Javi is dead and buried beneath the snow, but Natalie shows him it's only a fox. Travis finds the strange, mossy tree stump. The next day Travis has strong feelings about which direction is best to search for Javi in, and we don't see more of him until Nat reveals the bloody pants. Not that weird, all things considered. New season, new wardrobe additions. Hiking on a caloric deficit with PTSD, you'll probably hallucinate. Pretty standard stuff.

Then Nat wears the coat. She takes it to lay Jackie's bones to rest at the crash site, and while she wears it she sees (hallucinates? prophesies? I'm not sure!) the white moose that they'll later lose to the lake (ergo the hunt, ergo Javi dies for real but more on that later).

We get to Old Wounds, the hunting competition, and Lottie wears the coat now. You see where I'm going with this but just to be thorough: she enters the realm of death dreams, talks with Laura Lee, almost freezes to death.

Episode five. Melissa wears the coat. Maybe that's not important! Maybe it's just to show that they all share the wardrobe, and that the side characters are as equally All In This Together as the main characters are. Or it could mean something that a peripheral character, wearing important wardrobe, framed in antlers (not unlike Travis in 2.01), has the line "maybe he did die, and that's his ghost." It's a little suspicious, and at this point starts to feel like a pattern.

Who wears it next, who wore it best!? That's right baby, it's Paul! For his dreamworld drifter, hallucination hunk Coach Ben Scott. Nicholas Urfe himself. Ben spends almost all of his time in a dream, until *drumroll please* Paul, very pointedly, takes the coat and walks out the door. "Where do you think you are, Ben?" he puts the coat on. "You had to have known you couldn't stay here forever. [...] What matters now is that you aren't welcome here anymore." Following Paul means committing to death (to dream), and until interruption that's the choice Ben makes. Because letting Paul (and the coat) go would mean committing entirely to reality.

Of course, the pièce de résistance is something I didn't even notice until I went looking for it. The first dozen times I watched, I thought that after Lottie's beating Shauna brought her a blanket. "Lottie's cold." But she doesn't. She brings her the coat. Lottie is laying with it when, in a fever dream, she witnesses/hallucinates/prophesies parts of the hunt.

It's there again (on the back of the chair) when she sits by the fire and speaks for the wilderness, appointing Nat their queen. Ben watches, having woken from the dream himself, as they all bow to Natalie and leave reality behind for good.

Of course, there are a lot of times when characters hallucinate strange things in the cabin while not wearing the coat, because they're all starving to death and traumatized. Mari. Shauna. Akilah. But in addition to that, it seems like a pattern worth noting that in each instance where a character wears the technicolor coat, the line between the real and the imagined seems to blur with more ease. Does dead cabin guy's technicolor dreamcoat help the Yellowjackets connect to the dream realm?

I'll be brief here with the biblical parallel: blah blah Joseph is the favorite son (you were always its favorite), his father gives him a technicolor coat (they're nothing special, they don't change color in the cold or anything). blah blah Joseph starts having prophetic dreams etc etc his jealous brothers throw Joseph down a pit (the wilderness chose) and bring his bloodstained coat back as false proof of his death (hanging on a branch. a couple miles back). You get my drift.

Does it mean anything? Who knows. But in a series where wardrobe is such an integral part of the storytelling, it felt worth paying attention to.

[captainofthetidesbreath]

in light of the clarifications about Chet's family, I'm thinking about Travis saying Fjord told Jester he had feelings for her when he realized she could have died "in the same way that he would have wished that he told Vandran maybe what he meant to him when he still had the chance" (Talks 2.125)

and I'm thinking about Chet talking about having found his family left and that "I meant to go back earlier and I just didn't" (3.27)

and I'm thinking about grief and loss in all their forms and how much of that is bearing the weight of all the things you meant to do and say but took too long and lost the chance to ever again

[miralines]

happy fuck the rose and you as well sunday! in honor, I am posting my thoughts about the line in pump shanty, because god do I have thoughts!

there are no rose reds at that point, right? they're fleeing the wedding. The only Rose explicitly in canon is... Rose. Snow's sister, who's just been kidnapped. Even for Greyditch, this seems... a little insensitive, to say the least.

But! There's also the phrasing. It's not "fuck Rose." It's "fuck the Rose."

See also Our Boy Jack. "When the red Rose, it comes a'marching," and "when the Rose comes over the water." Now, these could very concievably both refer to the Rose Reds, but consider: what if they don't?

What if the Rose is an established Crown insignia? Greyditch isn't saying fuck Rose, he's saying fuck the Crown. This makes a lot more sense in context.

This leads me to believe that Rose was named for the Crown symbol, which. Adds whole new layers to everything that happens to her. Woman destined from birth, by her name, to be a tool for Cole. I think her parents saw her red hair (the Crown’s color) and named her for it, in the hopes she’d continue their family’s legacy of serving the king. And she did, and every one of her clones did, to hundreds of thousands of deaths…

[britney-rosberg06]

i have spoken a *lot* about how important Luke’s relationship to his siblings is to his character. How much Luke really does love them. And as much as i believe that he loves them

He still abandoned them

He let them down, broke promises, scarred them and then left them with two kids who are both canonically Percy’s age and younger in charge.

And as much as we love Conner and Travis they shouldn’t have had to be running the largest cabin by themselves especially when that cabin—who is family—just went through a massive trauma because of Luke.

Not to mention what Luke did to their reputations. He made the cabin that welcomes in the unclaimed and the minor demigods untrustworthy, even 4 years after he left Travis and Conner and the rest of Hermes cabin are still being accused of being traitors.

Luke loved Annabeth, he loved Thalia, he loved the kids he took care of in Hermes. He loved them enough to leave to make what he thought would be a better life for them. But he didn’t love them enough to stay.

He had to choose between Family and Glory. And Glory wins everytime

[whatyourehungryfor]

Specifically having Travis and Jackie have sex is so interesting because both of them, I feel, are doing it to fulfill something they feel like needs to happen for them to be secure in gender/sexuality. And in the end it has consequences and is iffy at best because neither of them have the proper vocabulary or positive examples needed to navigate that!

With Travis he says yes because he misses Nat and is insecure that she's slept with multiple people while he has been with no one. When it comes to how this might affect his relationship had the night not gone batshit insane, he doesn't think because the ideals he has tell him he NEEDS to have sex to be a better man for Natalie as opposed to just being there for her and communicating normally. Toxic masculinity n all that with him desperately trying to hold onto anything that makes him feel more masculine, more capable, more desirable- but it's an ill fitting role (transfem Trav truthers I see you).

As for Jackie, there's a lot going on there. First up is the fact that she's essentially given up on survival at that point and is preparing for death accordingly in a passively suicidal sort of way (which might I add Travis also experiences. Just later) so she feels the need to Do Things. As for the sex stuff itself, from the scene in the pilot and Shauna's admittedly less reliable meat shed conversations, it's pretty clear that it wasn't comfortable at the best of times and his pressuring sounded like it was pretty consistent. Jackie's view of virginity and sex sounds almost transactional at times; a "he's waited long enough" type deal. Then there's the fact that it was wrapped up in Shauna: telling Shauna while wearing her flannel, looking at Shauna, having sex in Shauna's bed.

Jackie seems to not know how to not involve some pressuring because Jeff always did that, and she's pretty past caring about being nice. Travis doesn't know how to not take what he should want, and later on he's tripping out. Add the emotional detachment of not having negative history, a poor mental state, toxic yuri, and shrooms, and you've got a recipe for vaguely unhealthy casual sex while thinking about other people!

All this to say it was a perfect storm for the two people most insecure in their sexuality/gender presentation to use each other to feel affirmed about it only to face massive consequences (however disproportionate) for something ultimately unfulfilling ("so that was sex?"). Those old standards they live by don't fly out here. It's still a society, they're just still unlearning the rules of the old one.

[invisible-pink-toast]

who's who in the zoo wilderness

like many yellowjackets fans i am Obsessed with the flashbacks in the pilot episode - but while many theories are about who pit girl is or who the antler queen is i also wanted to have a look at who each of the creepy cloaked cultee's might be under their masks...

Info

in the flashbacks we have nine characters -

pit girl (called "The Runner" in the script)

antler queen (called "The Shaman")

the one wearing beaver fur ("The Overseer")

the one wearing a skunk fur ("The Hunter")

the one in the pink hood ("The Butcher")

one wearing an owl

one wearing racoons

one wearing what appears to be a wolf

one wearing pants/leggings in a way that looks rabbit-like.

The antler queen is the name the fans have given the mysterious veiled figure - but the creators have been firm in saying that is an interpretation and not a fact. What we know about this figure is she's referred to as "The Shaman" and she's obviously a significant figure in the group - but not necessarily the queen/leader. I don't think this character is automatically the leader of the cult.

The definition of a shaman includes:

A member of certain traditional societies, especially of northern Asia and of North and South America, who acts as a medium between the visible world and an invisible spirit world and who practices magic or sorcery for purposes of healing, divination, and control over natural events.

The term shamanism comes from the Manchu-Tungus word šaman. The noun is formed from the verb ša- ‘to know’; thus, a shaman is literally “one who knows.” 

So of these nine, seven of them must be our seven known survivors:

just a note: aside from sammi hanratty (misty) none of the other actors were playing characters in this scene - those roles were filled by body doubles. so i'm not going to be too specific in comparing looks to try and match these characters to our known characters. There's also the fact that these scenes were written and filmed for the pilot before the show was greenlit and since then the story has changed somewhat (for example - van most likely originally dying from the wolf attack but that being rewritten because they loved what liv hewson did with the character and wanting them to continue). So I'll mostly be focusing on the characters we know were absolutely intended to be there: Shauna, Tai, Natalie (confirmed to survive in the pilot) as well as Travis and Lottie (confirmed to survive later in s1).

Theories/Predictions/Headcanons

Only one figure is 100% confirmed - the Overseer being Misty, as she is the only character seen to remove her fur mask at the end of the pilot episode.

The other that is basically confirmed is the identity of the Butcher being Shauna.

Not only was Shauna... literally the butcher in the past and the present ("Shauna, you're the best with the knife, so you'll handle the body. I mean cut it up." - Misty in 1x10) but when Shauna kills Adam she has flashbacks that include the Butcher bleeding the Runner's corpse.

Then there's the Runner, and given that she dies gruesomely she is not one of the survivors, but is one of the yellowjackets who survived past the end of s2.

Aside from her face, she is the character we see the most of physically (so i will mention her physical appearance in relation with who her character might be) - she has long dark hair and lighter/olive coloured skin.

based on this we know that pit girl is most likely either Gen or Mari (my vote is mari, and i wrote a meta on why). now that gen has been recast for s3 :( i'm thinking it's almost definitely mari.

that's 3/9 and where the clearest examples stop.

Owl

I think the animals were chosen with intention, both by the costume designer and within the story by the characters. whereas the other masks seem more for the sake of warmth (like the raccoon pelts sort of sewed together into a hood) this one feels a lot more symbolic. like can you even skin an owl while keeping the feathers??

I think this is a reference to Tai's connection with the "Other Tai" - the one who comes out in sleepwalking, and somehow knows the lay of the land (where the symbols are, where the other yellowjackets are) in a way that Tai doesn't understand. The imagery of having a character appear to literally have two faces just screams Tai to me.

From some very basic research it seems that owl can symbolically mean: wisdom, a guide in the dark, death, visions, etc.

While this could relate to Tai, it could also relate to Lottie.

While as the audience we know Lottie is schizophrenic and without her meds, the others have taken Lottie's visions as signs from the wilderness and treat her as the resident seer. While she's clearly trying to pull away from that role and the responsibility it entails by the end of s2 - the other yellowjackets already look to her as someone with the knowledge to guide them through the wilderness.

There's also the clothing. While most clothes seem to be passed around communally (a sweater Misty & Mari wear in s2 is the legwarmers on the owl and the mask on the skunk) there are some items that are reserved for specific characters (like Shauna wearing Jackie's butterfly shirt).

In the '96 timeline Tai wears a lot of patterned blue and purple clothes, some of which almost definitely become part of the outfit for this owl character.

There's also the vest - it could be an animal fur but it has some of similarities to Lottie's fluffy coat, especially one that's become dirtier while stranded without the cabin. This coat is only worn by Lottie. The raccoon character also wears a similar vest, so it could just be fur, but Lottie's coat resembles the owl character's vest more based on the colour, or the coat could have been split in two.

Overall I think the owl character is most likely Tai.

in doomcoming and in the hunt in the future the upper half of tai's face is covered and it makes sense to me that trend would continue in all her hunt outfits. there's also the repeated imagery of eyes within her story - the man with no eyes, her grandmother's eyes, sammy's doll on the altar missing an eye, so her outfit having a taxidermy owl with no eyes tracks.

Wolf

unfortunately not many clear images exist for this character. i'm not even sure if the pelt they're wearing is a wolf, it could also be a bear, but i'm going with wolf for now.

i think this is Travis. travis is the other hunter of the group and it makes sense that the characters furs might come from their own hunts/kills. symbolism wise travis does fit a wolf as well - loyalty, protection, strength. wolves are closely tied to the bonds of packs and family, making sense that travis would be the lone wolf as he's lost his father and brother out here.

tai and van are also associated with wolves - but i don't think either of them would want to wear one all the time, given that van was attacked by one and tai is haunted by them.

the wolf character also has some small details that fit for travis' character. their face is covered from the eyes down, something travis often does throughout season 2. the wolf, owl and skunk characters are also the only ones (that we can see) wearing fingerless gloves. given that the last time travis saw javi happy was him being gifted gloves by natalie, and that much of their clothes would have been destroyed in the fire (but not javi's, which were most likely still outside) i can see travis wearing javi's gloves.

The Hunter / Skunk

i think this is Natalie. before the season 2 finale i would've said this was 100%. now knowing that natalie is their new leader, there is the possibility that she is the antler queen character, which i will talk about later, but for me this character only makes sense as natalie.

nat's the hunter! even as a new leader, she's still the most capable and knowledgeable in hunting. travis is very much her second while she leads the hunting trips. it also makes sense that as the leader she would be the first one to check The Runner, to stand over the pit. both an 'honour' and a duty.

natalie's also been the one standing over the bodies so far. she's the one waiting outside with jackie's body at the start of 2x03, she's the one who takes jackie's remains and has a short memorial for her. she's the one who stays outside the longest, standing over travis with javi's body. obviously not definitive but does work with the skunk character.

as for the clothes - the hunter wears the iconic co-ed soccer shirt, pink converse, and for a mask the cloth is currently a sweater within the show.

the shirt begins the show as van's - but almost every character has worn it now (including tai, travis, akilah, etc.). the pink connverse have never been quite as clear, but it appears that might have originally been shauna's (a darker colour that most likely faded over the 19 months) and have been worn by at least lottie, gen & tai. the sweater that the mask is made of has been worn by misty, mari & mel. so none of that narrows anything down sdjflsakhfl;h

i think the skunk is quite a specific choice too. could be about seeing things in black & white, about keeping your distance, etc. there's not a lot about skunk symbolism but it mainly seems to involve confidence, courage and direction. these are interesting when paired with natalie, given that she fits some very well but struggles with others.

it's also implied in the original pilot script that this character is natalie.

while we do see the hunter pulling up the runner's body with the rope, the scene with natalie does not make it into the episode. it does suggest that when filming the pilot this character was thought of to be natalie though. of course, as the show progressed this may have changed.

still in 1x10 when it's decided that shauna will cut up adam's body, natalie is the one who volunteers to help her, while misty is the one who directs all of them, mirroring this scene with the butcher (shauna), overseer (misty) and hunter (natalie).

some say that the hunter is van - has a similar build and the general blankness/darkness that van has by the end of s2, as well as being the shirt's og owner. but van wasn't supposed to be there in the initial conception of this character. while it may have changed now, for me this character is natalie.

Raccoon & Rabbit

I'm honestly not sure who these two might be. One is most likely Van, given that we know she survives.

Early on there were theories that Jackie was the Rabbit, due to her association with rabbits, which makes sense, but now we know Jackie's dead. Then they were possibly Javi, but he's dead too. As for symbolism, I'm not sure who of the remaining Yellowjackets fits either of these characters.

I think the creators were purposefully ambiguous to leave themselves with options. If the audience doesn't know who is who, they have the opportunity to change the story slightly as the show progresses (like with Van surviving).

The Shaman / Antler Queen

while initially thought to be lottie, as she is set up as the leader in the wilderness, the season 2 finale revealed that natalie was the new leader. both of these characters could be the shaman, but i feel as though it makes more sense for natalie to be the hunter. even though there are moment that in retrospect hint that natalie becomes the leader (misty's devotion, natalie stating that she lacked a purpose after they were rescued, tai and shauna's conversation about nat being the reason they're alive), there are no clear references to natalie being the antler queen character in the story so far (although that could have been hidden on purpose for the reveal).

in the adult timeline the others are terrified of the antler queen in a way that's different from their reactions to the symbol from the wilderness. when they receive the postcards or realise the symbol is under travis' body they are disturbed, they have a distrust of the symbol and everything it reminds them of.

but their reactions to the shaman are different. she appears in shauna's flashbacks when she kills adam, in natalie's visions/hallucinations after she overdoses, and in lottie's visions/hallucinations after hearing natalie's experience and in her office with the fake therapist. each of them are utterly terrified when she appears.

i think who the shaman is depends on what her role truly is. as i've already said, the "antler queen" is a title made up by the fans.

Leader:

The Shaman does appear to be the leader of the group, sitting in the centre of the semi-circle, being elevated, everyone waiting for her go-ahead to begin the feast, and everyone waiting for her to leave first.

If The Shaman is the leader, then she is Natalie.

This is supported by the editing in the pilot episode - at the '96 party when Natalie gets high, she stands by the fire and sees Misty standing across from her. It then cuts to the Overseer bringing the Shaman the cooked feast.

Chief Mourner:

If the Shaman is the chief mourner, it would depend on who the Runner is. If she's gen, the Shaman would most likely be mel in this instance. if she's mari, the most likely mourner would be akilah. the shaman doesn't appear to have akilah's dark skin, but body doubles were used and her face is veiled. if akilah has already died, the mourner might be lottie or gen.

It would be interesting with the idea that the antler queen changes from person to person. That they're all still terrified of "her" when what she represents is you losing the one you love most, you being the one with the most grief.

This is supported by what's happened with the two acts of cannibalism so far in the series. Shauna is Jackie's chief mourner, she is the one to light her funeral pyre, she is the one to give the go ahead that they should eat Jackie's body ("She wants us to." - Shauna in 2x02). Travis is Javi's chief mourner, and he is also the one to give the go ahead to eat Javi's body, everyone rushing in for the 'meat' after Travis has put Javi's heart on the pan.

However the Shaman is never seen eating. Both Shauna and Travis have the first bite of their loved one, whereas the Shaman only nods for the feast to start. It's possible this is part of a ritual that evolved over time, but it's still puzzling.

Spiritual Advisor :

if the antler queen is some sort of spiritual advisor, then she's most likely lottie. this fits with what we've seen in the '96 timeline already, with lottie's wilderness connection and the reverence shown to her by other team mates. even though lottie abdicates her role of leader in the s2 finale and claims she 'can't hear' the wilderness anymore - it's clear this is because of the weight of the responsibility to keep them alive, as well as her grief and guilt over javi's death.

still, several of the others seem confused at lottie's decision, and only seem to be accepting natalie as the leader because lottie said so. if this is something that creates tension within the group, it makes sense that natalie might appoint lottie a role where they can still look to her.

natalie as the leader/hunter is the one brining in the kill, but lottie as a spiritual advisor/shaman is the one leading the ritual.

this is supported by how in the adult timeline when they are having another hunt, it's lottie that leads it, not natalie. though that may be because lottie was the one to initiate the hunt. lottie also still acts as a spiritual advisor, with the others coming to her for advice.

the other option for a spiritual advisor is Tai. Not necessarily tai though... but Other Tai.

Much about Other Tai still remains a mystery. Is she another personality, a response to the trauma and repression, some sort of possession from the wilderness? In the adult timeline Lottie says that Other Tai is a part of Taissa, but Other Tai's conversation with Van in the woods raises questions about this.

Van: How do you know where you're going? Other Tai: He shows me. Van: Who's "he?" Other Tai: The one with no eyes. Van: Is that who you always follow? Other Tai: Only when she lets me. Van: Okay there's a "she" too, am I "she?" Other Tai: [shakes head] Van: Then who is "she?" Other Tai: Taissa. Van: Then who are you? Other Tai: [gives Van a look before walking away]

Other Tai's ability to track the whereabouts of the other survivors (Javi, Natalie), her connection to the man with no eyes, and knowing where all of the symbols are imply something more supernatural then just "sleepwalking".

Other Tai is the one to participate in cannibalising Jackie, she's strongly implied to be the one who pushes Taissa to continue running for senate even after she told Simone she would drop out, and she is the one to behead their fucking dog and make an altar in their basement. The creators and actors have talked about Other Tai and explain that she has Tai's best interest in mind, but she is willing to do what Tai wouldn't do to get it. Other Tai has a connection to the wilderness and the supernatural, she desires power and can become violent. She could very well be The Shaman.

"I don't know how bad it's going to get this time, but you know how bad it can get." - Tai in 1x06

Group Hallucination:

It's been theorised that the Shaman / Antler Queen doesn't really exist at all.

With the show toeing the line between visions, hallucinations and grief-induced psychosis with multiple characters (including Lottie, Tai, Shauna, Natalie, Travis) it's possible that as the group spirals more and more out of control and into ritualistic cannibalism - a way that they attempt to cope is through this Shaman. A 'physical' manifestation of the Wilderness itself. Something that gives them permission to feast on the flesh of their teammates, but does not eat herself, because she's not really there.

We only see The Shaman during the feast scene, and in other's visions/hallucinations. We know there are seven known survivors, but during the pilot's flash forward scene we see eight. Only if The Shaman doesn't exist, it's our seven survivors and a hallucination sitting around the fire.

So in the end my main theories/predictions/headcanons stand as:

Mari as The Runner / Pit Girl

Misty as The Overseer / Beaver

Shauna as The Butcher / Pink Hood

Natalie as The Hunter / Skunk

Tai as the owl

Travis as the wolf

Lottie as The Shaman / Antler Queen

the one I am least sure of is The Shaman, she could still be Tai or a hallucination, and I look forward to finding out!

[the-lonelyshepherd]

what’s your opinion on the travlottienat s2 sex scene

hi! um category five autism event and i got way too serious about this. however its not my problem.

oookay SO first off obligatory i am a minor BUT we are analyzing this from a narrative/plot perspective and not in a sexual way. theres naked people in art its fine. I think this scene is fascinating from like. not a shipping perspective but a character based one. it shows a lot about travis and it also shows a lot about lottienat (mostly talking abt the character combo and less the ship) and also jackie. yeah, jackie.

Madonna della Pietà, Michaelangelo

To start - even w how it looks, this is a Lottienat scene. Not even from a shipping perspective but because this scene SHOWCASES their "rivalry", the contrast in their characters and how they are perceived to the rest of the team (w Travis as a stand in for the team). It shows how they're both very present figures in the whole yellow jackets situation (shown through travis but can apply to all of them imo). Nat is there with travis. shes physical, shes providing. But lottie is also there spiritually, and against the norm, leading whats going on.

Nat as the physical

lottie as the spiritual.

so despite the fact that natalie is physically there, travis cant (probably physically cant as hallucinations are NOT voluntary) take his mind off lottie. because she can give him something, in his mind, that nat cant. Shes almost an escape - nat is the harsh reality hes living while lottie is the voice that brings him hope that his brother is alive. lottie is someone who can lead in a way that he wants to make sense. and its an idealized version of her in his mind, probably stemming from his issues w authority figures like his dad and the built up version of masculinity in his mind.

And this scene also emphasizes Nat’s role in the Javi situation. Because of this:

The wound on her leg where she faked Javi’s death so that Travis would stop his self-destructive search for his brother, who by all means should have been dead. Why? Because who is Nat but a realist? She’s gotten everything from life thrown at her and came out of it with that attitude, and who can blame her?

But this scene is right after she brings Travis forged proof that his brother is dead. Her guilt is present through this scene, and showing the wound is to emphasize that. layers!!! but travis has a lot of guilt throughout this scene as well - not only because of the supposed death of his younger brother that he as the older sibling feels at fault for but also… the jackie situation.

The Jacke of it all:

yeah this is a jackie scene. not only is it right before when they FUCKING EAT HER but like in spirit as well. Okay so the thing is that jackie is the character who puts the most emphasis on virginity, we all know this, but in the end it's travis that gets the "first time" that she puts so much emphasis on. Yes, jackie and travis lose their virginities to each other, but in this scene travis checks off doing it with his actual girlfriend. That, and he does almost the same thing jackie did with jeff. She looks to shauna's photo, travis thinks of lottie. They have to be outside of their bodies to perform because both of them have hangups (for one reason or another).

It's not that Travis doesn't want to have sex like jackie with jeff, he clearly tries, but he can't do it while thinking very clearly. First by being drugged, then by imagining himself doing something unrelated. And they would've been happier if they hadn't done it - jackie is immediately shunned for it. If you think about it, she literally dies for it. Travis feels like he cheated and did something wrong despite being drugged out of his mind and having no real control over the situation (something jackie didnt know). and then IMMEDIETLY after this scene, there’s the Jackie feast. Not only is she everywhere symbliocally, shes also physically in them now. THE JACKIE OF IT ALLLLL

The Pietà

The Pietà is a reference to the 6th sorrow of mary. for all you guys who arent christian/catholic →

The Seven Sorrows of Mary are seven significant moments in her life:

Simeon's prophecy of joy and sorrow.

The flight to Egypt to escape King Herod.

Finding Jesus in the temple after being lost.

Mary meeting Jesus on his way to crucifixion.

Witnessing Jesus' crucifixion and death.

Holding Jesus' body after his crucifixion.

Jesus' burial, which Mary mourns.

To clear things up here - lottie as mary in this context is not a “maternal” as in motherly way - imo its supposed to be peace and hope, guidance/authority. travis, despite being famous for his daddy issues, is hinted at having mommy issues as well (see: him not getting hugged goodbye by his mom in the pilot while his dad and javi both do)

also, he clearly struggles a lot w masculinity - having a woman in authority doesnt come naturally to him, but in this moment it is his only comfort.

so in the wilderness, there’s a complete power shift from the outside world. in this isolated environment there’s a female majority - specifically, the team, who already (roughly….. it gets messy but ykwim) trust and know each other. they already have a, albeit shifting, power dynamic established. in the normal, precrash, world, it would be isolated to them. but post crash, they are now the majority and the three guys left standing are now forced to assimilate into that instead.

Ben had power - he was one of their coaches and an adult - but with the death of coach martinez, he loses a lot of power 1) because he’s only an assistant 2) hes outnumbered 3) he doesnt want to be in charge of these insane girls anymore. he just wants gay daydreams. let him live.

Then there’s Javi - he’s younger, and none of the girls really know him, but they’re generally nice to him. he cant contribute much though - and eventually he has to contribute all he has - his literal flesh.

Finally travis - arguably the most involved as he is the same age as the team. this puts him on their field as “involved”. He originally has this very built up view of masculinity that you can tell stems from a place of self consciousness/ self loathing as well as a buildup of society’s expectations on him as a teenage boy in the 90’s. He’s supposed to be tough, hes supposed to be in charge, hes supposed to be better. And when hes thrown into this female dominated space it completely falls apart. He’s not the best shooter, he doesn’t have authority or leadership. The only other older male figures are dead or have tried their best to remove themselves from the situation. He has to completely reevaluate everything he knows - Travis has come to learn that there is power in being near and simply being an approximation of femininity.

Travis has come to learn that there is power in being near and simply being an approximation of femininity. Travis has gone from the top (he was never really there, but the built up idea of masculinity put him there in his mind, though even then he had doubts and it came from a negative place) and to bottom of the totem pole - and now he’s rising back up to somewhere in the middle by connecting with femininity, by recognizing women in authority, and also trying to have that hope and spiritual belief that is brought about by these female figures. The middle is where travis can reconcile with the weirder things (ive been in discussions about how travis actually parodies a lot of classic feminine tropes) that clash with what travis should be.

overall this scene is fucking insane. its lottienat its travnat its mommy issues its daddy issues its deadass jackie its an older brothers guilt its religious its a sin its deconstructing the very nature of yourself and those around you. all through the power of weird sex hallucination. and eating someone right after.

if youre still here i love you. please send me yellowjackets discussion asks i love them so much <3 feel free to ask questions and shit, also if none of this makes sense im sorry lmao.

ALSO. special thanks to @periwinklekryptonite who like carried this discussion and came up with like half of tjis. ask him about trans travis or travis in general or maybe pike. shoooo go send him travis questions.

[ludinusdaleth]

Travis: "They're just assuming if they wake him up, Predathos will be like 'thanks! I'm gonna go eat some gods now!' And not just devour them and everyone on the planet instantly. They're just assuming."

[lesbianjackies]

Thoughts on elaborate Period Rituals

oiugugjghrhfhfghgh

Okay.

so we’ve talked about this in travnation obviously but for those who do not know (literally everyone else) i really want periods to become a significant part of the wilderness cult and the rituals the yellowjackets partake in — specifically in the sense of their periods syncing up: shared blood and shared womanhood.

now. i want to talk about how this pertains to travis.

we’re going to analyze this from the assumption that travis is becoming a woman through her integration into the cult. i will give a full analysis on transfem travis if people are interested but for this we’re just gonna go off that assumption so i can delve deeper into the period aspect of it specifically.

travis has always had this sort of fixation on periods. i noticed this recently — in blood hive she plays it off as disgust but it’s not, really, if you examine the way she talks about it.

her response to nat’s teasing “are you scared of our menses?” remark is anxiety — she replies with a nervous “well i didn’t say that.”

the truth is — or, at least, how i read it is — that she is. but it’s not in the way you might think. she’s not disturbed, or disgusted, or intimidated by the girls’ menstrual cycles. she’s fascinated. she’s intrigued. she’s, in some way, jealous of this bond the other girls have, this connection they have with each other through the blood of their womanhood.

i think she wants in on it.

fast forward to qui, when shauna’s having her baby — who is the first to suggest the ritual to keep her safe? who is the first to spill blood, the first to bleed upon the altar of shauna’s womanhood and say, “we hear the wilderness and it hears us”? travis.

travis is the one who slices a knife across her palm, spilling her own blood as shauna bleeds next to her. i think shauna and travis are very connected in an often overlooked way — and i can talk about this, too, if anyone would like to hear it — and i think it is very apparent in this moment, in the intersection of their coming of ages, of their coming into womanhood.

shauna is giving birth. this is what is culturally and societally seen as the peak of womanhood, the fulfillment of a woman’s true purpose. next to her, travis is willfully shedding the first of her blood, the first step a girl takes into becoming a woman.

i would argue this moment is travis’s metaphorical first period.

now, there’s a subversion of the expectations of a woman going into labor here. shauna loses her baby. she doesn’t give birth to life, but to death. shauna is losing her cultural womanhood in this moment. she’s losing her connections to her life before the wilderness; she’s becoming less of a person dependent on others (on jackie, on jeff, on her baby) and more of a woman who belongs to the wilderness.

travis is going through a similar event. she has lost her father. she believes herself to have lost javi (though really that comes later). her only significant relationships now are nat and lottie — two opposing female forces in her life. she’s already given herself to them (edible complex sex scene — check out this analysis by @the-lonelyshepherd), but now she must fully give herself to womanhood, to the wilderness, to shauna.

that’s what’s going on in that scene.

now, to conclude, i believe this spilling-of-blood-as-travis’s-period thing is going to continue into season three and get more intense as it goes on — or, at least, i would like for it to. i think the spilling of specifically travis’s blood is important to the way these rituals are structured — she gives blood when shauna is giving birth. javi’s blood is hers and he’s the one the wilderness chooses. i think the other girls are going to become aware of this. i think travis’s blood is going to keep getting spilt.

and she’s going to spill it herself.

[itchose]

in depth headcanon questions |  @suhspiria asked: who was the one family member your muse always looked up to, if any?

i don't know if "looked up to" is the right way to phrase it, but at least for the family member he admired most, it's javi. it's javi in the way that travis views him as this carefree individual who is brave and unafraid of going right up anyone and just saying whatever's on his mind. it's javi in the way that he is seemingly so sure of who he is and what he wants to do. he's not afraid to ask questions, not afraid to dance in front of everyone in the cabin, not afraid to go up to shauna with a journal in her hand and ask her directly what she's doing, not afraid to be vulnerable and give his art to someone else. in the end, it's javi in the way that he refused to talk to anyone, no matter how rude they got about trying to force him to talk, and no matter how frustrated travis himself got waiting for answers.

and even if some of these things aren't even true for javi, even if travis's perception of hi is totally off, it doesn't matter, because this is how travis views him. travis sees javi as everything he never let himself be.

he's scared of being perceived, it makes him feel so exposed and small and it just makes him angry. people talk about him, they call him names, they spread rumors, they assume the worst from him, and he has the worst way of coping with it in response. javi doesn't seem to let things bother him - and again, even if that's not true, it's how travis sees it with him, and he's so envious of it. and part of that is just that javi is still a kid, and maybe travis used to be like that too, but he's just so far removed from it now that he longs to feel that bravery he sees in javi. and he'll always regret not encouraging him for it and instead, putting him down for it, like he spent the last yfew years of javi's life doing.

his father is obviously not even an option in this, and he never was. when travis was really little, he did try to believe that his father was the kind of dad he was supposed to have, but he let go of that dream pretty quickly, mostly when his father started trying to push soccer on him and it ended poorly for both of them. he does love his mother, and things are mostly better between the two of them, but he always felt like she preferred javi over him, which is obviously heightened when he returns from the wilderness and realizes he has no way to connect with his mother at all, when he's the only one that returns.

as for someone he did genuinely look up to, it was probably his grandmother who lived with them for most of his life. she's the one who taught him how to drive, who attempted to encourage him to get involved at school + extracurriculars (even though he didn't listen), and tried to be a source of comfort when his father clearly did the opposite. she's the only person he ever felt close to being himself around, whoever that was. he was able to be a little more vulnerable with her than he was with anyone else.

[blazingstar24]

What if the disaster that struck Pravenier is connected to the destruction of Molaesmyr?

Hear me out, both incidents happened several hundreds of years back. Though the exact timeframe of Pravenier is unknown. Pravenier was destroyed by a mass poisoning event and Molaesmyr was destroyed by poisonous fumes (miasma) which killed and corrupted anything it came in touch with.

In Chet’s vision, he got the sense that the poison came from something settling within the water supply of the entire area. The corruption in Molaesmyr came from beneath the city as the crystal was in the base of Caes Mosor.

Is it possible that where the Amethyst Gulch lies on the planes, it lines up with Molaesmyr in the Material Plane? And the poison that settle into the water was the miasma from Molaesmyr. Because when Ludinus tried to do the communion, it was during an apogee solstice. Which means the ley lines were screwy so he could try and reach Ruidus. But also on the flip side, ley lines aren’t just one way doors. They can spill into many different places.

Also the idea of needing to close a communion is something we see in many other sorts of summoning entities rituals. We know Ludinus makes it out of Molaesmyr somehow (despite all things considered as wouldn’t he have been at the very epicenter of the miasma?) Which implies he had to have bailed quickly to not get fucked up at the very least if not die. So what if the communion was left open? And the same poison that destroyed Molaesmyr spilled through to other places. Places like Pravenier, which seemed to have a similar temple to the Archheart. And the crystal that Ludinus used was theorized to have some kind of connection to them.

It certainly could be nothing but I just got strong Molaesmyr parallels from this place!

[novelconcepts]

Staunch hater of men but travis is just my skrunkly little guy. Love how sad he is. Love how tragic he is. He’s just one of the girls and he loves it.

Travis is so good, largely because, if this show had been made in the 90s, he WOULD have been a girl. He and Javi both would have been the lone girls in a sea of boy soccer players. Travis is the love interest; Javi would have been the archetypical annoying little sister. And because YJ likes to play with gender dynamics and flip the scripts, they both still play out as you’d expect the Sole Girls in a male-dominated story to do. Travis’ whole arc is about learning to navigate outside of what society tells him to be—and, other than that, he’s there to be Nat’s love interest. Even as an adult, in Natalie’s memory sequences, he gets the Dead Wife lighting and soft framing in bed. He even gets, as a friend pointed out, fridged to further her story. When the girls get progressively more violent, Travis is the victim, or he’s told to take Javi out of the room. He starts off as a shitty boy, as is befitting of 1996 culture, and he gets to unlearn that which does not serve the hive. He is tragic. He is doomed from the start. He is learning to be soft in a situation where softness gets you killed. He is the representative of sibling dynamics in the wild, and now he’s the answer to the question: are you still a big brother when your younger brother is gone? He’s fucking devastating.

I just really love that the only three men in the wilderness are the gay coach, the complicated love interest, and the sacrificial lamb. Those are all positions usually reserved for women, and I love YJ for flipping it around.

[captainofthetidesbreath]

legit I feel like one of Travis's unique strengths as a performer within the CritRole cast is how he approaches the emotional, weighty, set-piece moments with an incredible patience and restraint and how unafraid he is of leaving things unsaid and of allowing a long pause. it often feels that he is very comfortable taking these narrative beats at a deliberately slow pace that leaves a silence for a moment to breathe or gain gravity. he is often perfectly content to take his time through a narrative beat and move at a measured rhythm.

he does this in monologues, solo scenes with the GM, in conversations with other player characters. I think this articulate patience and careful restraint Travis has gets lost in his reputation as someone impulsive and loud. his apparent comfort with silence and slow pacing feels uncommon in actual play at large even, and it's a truly skilled and admirable feature of his style.

[nunyabznsbabes]

The Yellowjackets' Cards

Misty pulls the Eight of Diamonds. Eight traditionally represents resurrection, regeneration, and new beginnings. The Diamonds suit symbolizes the merchant class, autumn, dedication, ethics, confidence, stability, and advancement. The Eight of Diamonds specifically is a sign of healing, passion, and safeguarding.

Akilah pulls the Seven of Spades. Seven traditionally represents warfare, protection, completeness, perfection, grace, and divine mercy. The Spades suit symbolizes the military, winter, water, grief, and loneliness. The Seven of Spades specifically is a sign of certainty, warning, loss, perception, intuition, and kindness.

Van pulls the Jack of Hearts. The Jack is a symbol of common blood, loyalty, good luck, deception, innocence, and new beginnings. The Hearts suit represents the Church, spring, fire, love, vows, and childhood. The Jack of Hearts specifically is a sign of love, youthful passion, emotional support, reconciliation, and the pursuit of inner knowledge.

Shauna pulls the Four of Diamonds. Four traditionally represents creation, completion, mental stability, change, and freedom. The Diamonds suit symbolizes the merchant class, autumn, dedication, ethics, confidence, stability, and advancement. The Four of Diamonds specifically is a sign of strength, a need for confrontation, sensitivity, dissatisfaction, defensiveness, stubbornness, rebellion, intuition, good fortune, new beginnings, change, and charm.

Travis pulls the Ace of Clubs. The Ace historically represented bad luck, but in the present day it represents strength, authority, power, and victory. The Clubs suit symbolizes agriculture, peasantry, summer, youth, and the earth. It is also the lowest-ranking suit in games that prioritize suits. The Ace of Clubs specifically is a sign for good luck, prosperity, abundance, power, and influence.

Tai pulls the Six of Spades. Six traditionally represents power, imperfection, humanity, broken connection, restored connection, union, romantic union, materiality, and success. This number is also associated with Satan/the Beast. The Spades suit symbolizes the military, winter, water, grief, secrecy, loneliness, obsession, and development. It is also the highest-ranking suit in games that prioritize suits. The Six of Spades specifically is a sign of infidelity, dishonesty, turbulence, rootlessness, growth, denial, avoidance, change, change, and renewal.

Melissa pulled the Three of Hearts. Three traditionally represents power, cycles, life and death, divinity, completeness, fulfillment, and perfection. The Hearts suit represents the Church, spring, fire, love, vows, and childhood. The Three of Hearts specifically is a sign of success, love, opportunity, and aid.

Javi pulled the King of Spades. The King is a symbol of masculinity, maturity, control, and command. The Spades suit symbolizes the military, winter, water, grief, secrecy, loneliness, loss, and development. It is also the highest-ranking suit in games that prioritize suits. The King of Spades specifically is a sign of reason, logic, authority, discipline, justice, dominance, charm, observation, cruelty, obstacles, and boundaries. Reversed, the King of Spades is a sign of irrationality, control, judgement, and dishonesty.

Natalie pulls the Queen of Hearts. The Queen is a symbol of leadership, authority, confidence, femininity, and power. The Hearts suit represents the Church, spring, fire, love, vows, and childhood. The Queen of Hearts specifically represents unconditional love, compassion, creativity, intuition, healing, counseling, warmth, and self-love. In a reversed meaning, the Queen of Hearts is a sign of insecurity, fragility, dependence, self-sabotage, martyrdom, and over-giving.