S02.E08: It Chooses

[Cranberry]

Quote

Shhh, it’s only going to get worse from here. Despite the whole "winter never’s gonna end" thing, the 1996 New Jersey state girls soccer champions decide to start their spring training early with an impromptu cardio session. Callie encounters an old flame, Van proves goalies never say die, most of the adults intentionally commune in the sharing shack, and, Lottie, baby, I hear the blues are calling for tossed salad and scrambled eggs. Mercy!

Original air date: May 19, 2023 (streaming) / May 21, 2023 (Showtime)

[WaltersHair]

Adult Lottie has gone full bye-bye. My opinion is that she's always been the 'It' of the Wilderness and is in the present. She lost her purpose when they were rescued. Don't drink the Flavor-aid, ladies.

Poor Javi. I guess Natalie never told Travis the truth.

[BitterApple]

Wowwwwwwwww. I was NOT expecting that ending. Poor Javi. It really isn't the wilderness choosing when you all stand around and let a kid drown, but whatever gets you through the day, ladies. No wonder Nat is so fucked up in the present. Javi was trying to help her escape and she let him die to save herself. I'm assuming Travis never found out the truth. 

And man, was it scary how fast everyone turned savage. I wish I'd gotten a better view of that underground shelter Ben found. I saw the pile of bones, but it was so damn dark I couldn't make anything else out. Where was the heat coming from? An underground spring?

Jeff lawyered up way too late. I figured the preview with the blood splashing across the family picture was another fakeout. They're getting a little too predictable. 

I'm not sure why they have Lottie stashed in the attic? That doesn't make much sense from a caretaking standpoint. 

Happy to see everything was laid out on the table in the present day, but not sure what Walter's agenda is going to be. Is he really going to sell Misty out to the cops? If so, I'm thinking those who theorized he has some tie to Adam are right after all. 

 

[Black Knight]

3 hours ago, BitterApple said:

I'm not sure why they have Lottie stashed in the attic? That doesn't make much sense from a caretaking standpoint. 

Probably so they don't have to listen to her moaning in pain all the time.

I think Walter plans to distract the police and send them in a different direction with his "information."

Poor Javi. He tried to save Natalie and she lets him die. Clearly she's never gotten over it. Interesting that Misty is the one who pulled her away and held her down and made her realize it was Javi or her. It sheds some light on their present-day dynamic where Misty thinks of them as friends and Natalie is repulsed by her.

The warmth of that underground place probably attracts small animals and birds who want to shelter. I'm no expert, but all those bones looked like they were pretty small, right? (ETA: I just read AV Club's recap and it said there were mushroom spores too.) I can see how Javi was able to survive. He had a good set-up, and of course there's still the possibility Other Tai was helping.

Lottie's thing with the drinks will be a great test of where the adult women stand on all this wilderness hocus pocus stuff. Obviously their teenage counterparts would nod and drink, but I hope the adults are smarter.

Jeff is so over his head.

[Badlands]

It's hard to imagine how they got so savage so fast. These are high school girls. who were mostly fine with murdering and eating their friend (I can't believe I even typed that sentence). Shauna was ready to slit her throat. Then they let Javi drown, when he could have been saved. Oh, sorry... the wildnerness chose. 🙄 BTW, it doesn't seem smart to eat the person who is the best with a gun (and one of the few with much sanity left).

Meanwhile, Ben found the hatch. I was concerned that someone was going to have to enter numbers into a computer every 108 minutes. Why did Javi keep it a secret? Was he still going there for lunch?

Edited May 19, 2023 by Badlands
Typo

[Black Knight]

I expect Javi kept it a secret so that if things got bad at the cabin again he could bolt to safety. Smart move on his part. I wonder if his silence at the cabin after he returned was really about protecting himself, protecting that secret shelter. It's a lot easier to keep a secret if you just refuse to say anything and pretend you're having some kind of mute episode. It's when you start talking that the problems really begin. Same reason why you shouldn't talk to the cops without a lawyer, Jeff.

I just rewatched the scene where the YJs come to their fateful agreement on murderous cannibalism. It's so interesting to find out that Lottie was actually upstairs, totally out of it. Not that I necessarily think she would have been against the plan, but I had assumed for a long time that she'd be the ringleader or one of the ringleaders, and instead she turned out to have zero involvement.

And of all people, it turns out the instrumental person was Tai. Not Shauna who was second on my card after Lottie, not psychopath Misty, not cold Mari. Yes, basically every other person had a line that helped move the discussion forward to its grim conclusion, but it's ultimately Tai who verbally crosses the Rubicon. Tai who essentially says someone has to be killed to feed everyone else.

[Brn2bwild]

I wish we had seen more discussion from the girls before the cards were brought out. I can't see Nat just going along with "the wilderness chooses" playing cards.  She would have said it was stupid nonsense, and maybe tried to get Javi to talk about how he survived to avoid having people killed.  And while I could see Tai going along if the injured person was Van, I don't see her willingly sacrificing for Lottie - especially if she or Van could have been a sacrifice.

[BitterApple]

I'm curious as to why Shauna was going to slit Nat's throat as opposed to shooting her? The latter is quick whereas bleeding out is painful and will take a few minutes. Interesting though that the practice of the "hunt" came about by accident. Travis creates a distraction to help Nat, leading to the chase. Also, interesting that the sacrifice didn't end up being the person who drew the Queen. If the chosen manages to kill before they're killed, are they off the hook? 

And where do they go from here? You can't exactly go back to being friends after a scene like that. I imagine the level of fear, mistrust and paranoia among the survivors will be ratcheted up significantly. They're going to be permanently on edge until the next round. I also wonder if they'll preemptively kill someone and make it look like an accident to avoid the possibility of being the next sacrifice. I can see this getting messy. 

I never considered that Javi was keeping his hideout a secret in case he needed an escape. Very smart plan, if that's the case. 

Poor Akilah and her mouse. It shouldn't have been that much of a shock, because how the heck was she feeding it, but I still jumped when Tai held up the mummified skeleton. 

 

[WaltersHair]

Some of the ambient music playing when Jeff is shown body parts sounds vaguely like the old Dexter ambient music.

Is Lottie just trying to save her compound by asking someone to sacrifice themselves? We've seen many sacrifices:

• Misty murdered Jessica the Closer
• Shauna murdered Adam
• Tai murdered her dog and has near murdered her wife, who may die yet
• Van has terminal cancer,, so her death is close.
• Nat lost Travis, though it could be argued that Lottie murdered him by lack of attention to his hanging.

[Black Knight]

I think when we look at the key things that were said in the discussion, it makes sense.

Misty tells everyone Lottie said to eat her if she dies.

Van says that she cannot imagine being there without Lottie (this is important for Tai, since she knows Van is having a difficult time).

In response to Mari saying optimistically that the wilderness won't let Lottie die, Travis says the wilderness can't prevent it if Lottie is starving.

Natalie then makes a big step forward by saying the same is true for all of them. This is the point where the discussion broadens from "saving Lottie" to "saving us all." Natalie is the one who does that and pushes them right up to the line.

Tai then takes them over the line by saying that they have to do something and it can't be Lottie (because Van).

At that point, then yes, the playing cards. Because with everyone agreeing now that someone has to die in order to save everyone else from starving to death, well, what else are you going to land on? Natalie and Tai are in this not because they want to save Lottie (Nat in particular would be just fine with Lottie dying, Tai mostly doesn't want it to be Lottie because of Van), but because they want to save themselves and as many other people as possible. Both Natalie and Tai - and everyone, really - understand that having everyone vote would completely tear apart the group. So it has to be a random method. Those who want to can tell themselves some mumbo jumbo about how "the wilderness is choosing through the cards," while skeptics like Natalie are satisfied with it just being random. Of course there is risk, but at this point, they believe they're all going to die soon if they don't get to eat. It's vote or have a game of chance.

[BingeyKohan]

4 hours ago, Badlands said:

Why did Javi keep it a secret? Was he still going there for lunch?

Hahaha yes, it's like that new restaurant you discover and want to keep to yourself so you can still get a table there...

[Thalia]

9 hours ago, BitterApple said:

I'm not sure why they have Lottie stashed in the attic? That doesn't make much sense from a caretaking standpoint. 

And how did they get her up there, when Mari had trouble carrying a bedpan down the ladder and they are all weak from hunger?  I decided adrenaline allowed them to chase Natalie through the snow.  

2 hours ago, Black Knight said:

And of all people, it turns out the instrumental person was Tai.

I suppose it makes sense as all along we've seen that Tai is more logic than emotion.  She saw that they truly had no choice.  I suppose it is also logical that the writers killed Javi.  By the time the post-writer's strike season 3 arrives, the actor will be old enough to be married and the father of two.  

I was fiddling on the internet during some of this -- did they show Natalie receiving the heart necklace?  I noticed she was wearing it in the final scene on the lake.  

I covet Walter's jigsaw puzzle table, even as I wonder if he keeps his cats in another room.  I rarely complete a puzzle that isn't missing at least one paw purloined piece.  

[Lila82]

The theme of this season seems to be one (or two) scene too few. In episode two, we needed just a little more seeing of the starvation that led them to eating Jackie, which would have made the transition from cannibalism to murder feel less abrupt. We know they're starving. We know they've moved past their horror and disgust over eating their teammate. But ritual murder? We needed more setup, to see the girls' faces and reactions as they agreed to sacrifice one of their own for the others to survive. Even the necklace needed like one line--yes, we can speculate that it's a symbolic passing of the torch from one victim to the next, but confirmation would have been nice.

The writers said they intentionally featured Shauna's domestic life more heavily because they like Warren Cole and Sarah Desjardins so much, and it was a mistake. We lost precious screen time that should have been devoted to showing what was happening in the wilderness. I loathe the tell, not show approach to storytelling, because it makes me fill in the pieces, which makes me speculate on the characters' motivations when it should be the actual writers telling us who and what their characters are. Mari's breakdown was a welcome surprise. I don't need episode upon episode of girls crying, but it was one of the more true-to-life moments that have been lacking this season. Living in the wilderness, starving, and climbing a ladder to help your friend/frenemy/spiritual guide with a bed pan really sucks. I like seeing little moments like those, as it helps remind us amongst all the spiritual mumbo jumbo, these are teenage girls fending for themselves against nature. We don't get enough reminders that they're kids being forced to do what many adults would be incapable of.

 

Quote

I'm curious as to why Shauna was going to slit Nat's throat as opposed to shooting her?

 

I wanted to know why they chose to do the murder in the living room. They know how much blood they'll need to clean up!

[jsm1125]

What annoys me about adult Lottie constantly saying that something brought the wilderness survivors to her compound is that Lottie herself (or her associates) kidnapped Natalie there. And Misty is only there because she wanted to find Natalie. 

[AstridM]

12 hours ago, WaltersHair said:

Adult Lottie has gone full bye-bye. My opinion is that she's always been the 'It' of the Wilderness and is in the present. She lost her purpose when they were rescued. Don't drink the Flavor-aid, ladies.

Poor Javi. I guess Natalie never told Travis the truth.

Agree. And Nat was right when she said they probably should’ve just let Lottie die after the beating, imo.

ETA - I love that you knew that it was Flavor Aid!

Edited May 19, 2023 by AstridM

[AstridM]

3 hours ago, WaltersHair said:

Some of the ambient music playing when Jeff is shown body parts sounds vaguely like the old Dexter ambient music.

Is Lottie just trying to save her compound by asking someone to sacrifice themselves? We've seen many sacrifices:

• Misty murdered Jessica the Closer
• Shauna murdered Adam
• Tai murdered her dog and has near murdered her wife, who may die yet
• Van has terminal cancer,, so her death is close.
• Nat lost Travis, though it could be argued that Lottie murdered him by lack of attention to his hanging.

Lottie murdered Travis. As soon as he handed over that remote to her, she should’ve walked away, called 911, ANYTHING other than press that button. She chose to press it.

[peachmangosteen]

1 hour ago, Lila82 said:

The theme of this season seems to be one (or two) scene too few. In episode two, we needed just a little more seeing of the starvation that led them to eating Jackie, which would have made the transition from cannibalism to murder feel less abrupt. We know they're starving. We know they've moved past their horror and disgust over eating their teammate. But ritual murder? We needed more setup, to see the girls' faces and reactions as they agreed to sacrifice one of their own for the others to survive. Even the necklace needed like one line--yes, we can speculate that it's a symbolic passing of the torch from one victim to the next, but confirmation would have been nice.

This so damn much. The other theme is hallucinations/dreams, which is so annoying.

I still can’t get over them wanting to do 5 seasons. I pray this writers strike gives them time to realize that is way too many.

What was under the tree besides the bones? I literally couldn’t see a damn thing in that scene, which is another deeply annoying thing, although not something only this show does.

I hope Van is the sacrifice in the finale because I have absolutely no desire to watch her illness play out at all. She’ll probably just decide to sacrifice herself.

As with this whole season, there were individual things in this ep I enjoyed or found interesting but overall it really doesn’t work for me. Such a let down from an amazing season 1.

[AstridM]

2 hours ago, Thalia said:

suppose it makes sense as all along we've seen that Tai is more logic than emotion.  She saw that they truly had no choice.

Imo, true logic would’ve led to her simply letting Lottie die, since she was already injured. Her emotions  led her to save Lottie for Van.

1 hour ago, jsm1125 said:

What annoys me about adult Lottie constantly saying that something brought the wilderness survivors to her compound is that Lottie herself (or her associates) kidnapped Natalie there. And Misty is only there because she wanted to find Natalie. 

Everything she does annoys me, lol.

30 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

This so damn much. The other theme is hallucinations/dreams, which is so annoying.

I still can’t get over them wanting to do 5 seasons. I pray this writers strike gives them time to realize that is way too many.

What was under the tree besides the bones? I literally couldn’t see a damn thing in that scene, which is another deeply annoying thing, although not something only this show does.

I hope Van is the sacrifice in the finale because I have absolutely no desire to watch her illness play out at all. She’ll probably just decide to sacrifice herself.

As with this whole season, there were individual things in this ep I enjoyed or found interesting but overall it really doesn’t work for me. Such a let down from an amazing season 1.

The hallucinations/dreams make sense to me, because the girls are literally starving and that’s what they’re experiencing. I do agree with you about the underground area Ben found. I couldn’t see a damn thing in there, either!

[peachmangosteen]

Did anyone see the underground area? I think maybe there was water? I tried to go back and look but it’s just so dark. I’m starting to wonder if maybe Ben just stays there now and perhaps was never rescued because the girls just assumed he died.

23 minutes ago, AstridM said:

The hallucinations/dreams make sense to me, because the girls are literally starving and that’s what they’re experiencing.

They make sense but they are deeply annoying to me. They can show me 15 hallucinations but decide to just let me assume how exactly they decided to draw cards/that the queen card means you dead/that the sacrifice will wear Jackie’s necklace, like nah I’m over it lol. 

[AstridM]

6 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

Did anyone see the underground area? I think maybe there was water? I tried to go back and look but it’s just so dark. I’m starting to wonder if maybe Ben just stays there now and perhaps was never rescued because the girls just assumed he died.

The make sense but they are deeply annoying to me. They can show me 15 hallucinations but decide to just let me assume how exactly they decided to draw cards/that the queen card means you dead/that the sacrifice will wear Jackie’s necklace, like nah I’m over it lol. 

I didn’t feel like I needed to see any more details about how they chose the card. The Queen of Hearts is well known from Alice in Wonderland as the figure who orders executions, and I just surmised that Shauna added the part with Jackie’s necklace on the spur of the moment. It wasn’t meant to be a chase/hunt, but Travis telling Natalie to run made it one. I do wish they had shown where that Queen of Hearts card came from though, as they had discussed earlier that the deck had no queens.

Edited May 19, 2023 by AstridM

[Cranberry]

Javi found the Queen cards... it was a blink-and-you'll-miss-it background moment.

[Chaos Theory]

Well yeah that happened.   Bye Javi you returned just to get eaten.

Jeff telling Callie about the baby Shauna lost in the wilderness was all kinds of unexpectedly heartbreaking.  

I love that the group is not a bit surprised that Misty “took care” of their Jessica Roberts problem.

Shauna not wanting to go to the sharing shack was kinda funny.

it really did not take much for the group to devolve into potential murderers.  

Jeff is the best most loyal husband on all of tv.  Fight me.

 

I love how the whole hunting thing started.  It was never supposed to be a hunt just a sacrifice.  Who picks the “Queen of hearts” card and Shauna gave Nat the necklace to wear just because and Javi told her to run to save her life and he ended up dying.   It allows for a certain mysterious element that just because you pick the wrong card doesn’t mean you will always get eaten.  It’s a fun way to add intrigue to the whole hunt and be hunted motifs.

 

Say what you want about Lottie and her mental health.  She disappears for a couple days and the group devolves pretty quickly.

Edited May 19, 2023 by Chaos Theory

[WaltersHair]

I don't know if there's any correlation, but coach avoided the Queen of Hearts by falling down the rabbit hole.

[AstridM]

1 hour ago, Cranberry said:

Javi found the Queen cards... it was a blink-and-you'll-miss-it background moment.

I saw that mentioned elsewhere, and I definitely missed it! Even my close captioning didn’t pick it up. 

[peachmangosteen]

It was brought up on Reddit a lot. It is kind of poignant/funny that Javi found the Queen cards. Although, where did he find them? Another thing they won't actually show us (and maybe they never even decided how he did) and just let us decide for ourselves. The writers are giving me Mike White vibes.

As a Lost fan, it sort of annoys me that this show isn't getting any of the shit Lost did. Although, at this point, I guess Lost wasn't getting it either. If this show actually tries to go 5 seasons they probably will too because it's clear to me they don't have enough to fill that and will just be putting a lot of filler in. I just hope it's mostly filler I enjoy like the stupid Adam murder stuff this season.

[Anela]

Damn, they really wanted to kill her! 
noo, they let javi drown? I’m crying.  She’s right, they shouldn’t have survived. That poor kid.

this must be why the one actress said that we would hate them. It works for me, anyway. They all stood around and let that boy drown.

Edited May 19, 2023 by Anela

[Chaos Theory]

This episode goes a long way into explaining a deeply fucked up Nat and Travis relationship.  Where a deeply angry and suicidal Travis punishes Nat and she lets him.   

[Anela]

As soon as Lottie saw the Antler Queen as her therapist, she should have found a way to talk to a real one, and get her pills. Instead, she's taken the deep dive into the wilderness BS. I hoped they wouldn't go there as adults, but I suppose it was inevitable. Just to amp up the drama. 

Going by the preview

Spoiler

If someone else dies, like the cop that Walter is likely drawing up there to kill (I think), maybe that will keep Lottie from letting someone else die. But then she's also covering up a murder of a cop, if that happens. 

I wouldn't blame Ben if he goes and hides in that tree for as long as possible. Nat tells someone they don't belong there, and that's probably him.

 

[Trillian]

PSA:  if you are ever in a situation where you are asking a cop “do I need a lawyer?”  - then, you NEED a lawyer. 

The whole search warrant business with the cop who knows he’s been accused of sexual impropriety with a minor being alone in a room with said minor was so ridiculous.  I am not enjoying that particular subplot. 

On the other hand, the horror of watching Javi die, poor Nat letting it happen to save her own life, will stay with me a long time.  Kudos to the writers for the increasing dread of watching them pull those cards, Shauna with the knife and all of it culminating in that scene in the ice.  That’s how you do horror, boys and girls.  It doesn’t need blood and gore.  I’m both dreading and looking forward to the season finale. 

Edited May 20, 2023 by Trillian

[sistermagpie]

18 hours ago, BitterApple said:

Wowwwwwwwww. I was NOT expecting that ending. Poor Javi. It really isn't the wilderness choosing when you all stand around and let a kid drown, but whatever gets you through the day, ladies. No wonder Nat is so fucked up in the present. Javi was trying to help her escape and she let him die to save herself. I'm assuming Travis never found out the truth. 

Or he did and accepted it like everyone else.

18 hours ago, BitterApple said:

Happy to see everything was laid out on the table in the present day, but not sure what Walter's agenda is going to be. Is he really going to sell Misty out to the cops? If so, I'm thinking those who theorized he has some tie to Adam are right after all. 

 

I don't think so given his music choice: Nothin's gonna harm you from Sweeney Todd is about a character swearing to protect another character from a murderer. He doesn't know she's in on it with the murderer. But Walter does!

11 hours ago, BitterApple said:

I'm curious as to why Shauna was going to slit Nat's throat as opposed to shooting her?

Probably because that's just Shauna's thing. It's like at Doomcoming.

11 hours ago, BitterApple said:

And where do they go from here? You can't exactly go back to being friends after a scene like that. I imagine the level of fear, mistrust and paranoia among the survivors will be ratcheted up significantly. They're going to be permanently on edge until the next round. I also wonder if they'll preemptively kill someone and make it look like an accident to avoid the possibility of being the next sacrifice. I can see this getting messy. 

I think they can given that they all agreed to the ceremony to begin with. And Shauna couldn't kill Nat.

9 hours ago, Thalia said:

And how did they get her up there, when Mari had trouble carrying a bedpan down the ladder and they are all weak from hunger?  I decided adrenaline allowed them to chase Natalie through the snow.  

Probably all together in some way, I guess.

 

9 hours ago, jsm1125 said:

What annoys me about adult Lottie constantly saying that something brought the wilderness survivors to her compound is that Lottie herself (or her associates) kidnapped Natalie there. And Misty is only there because she wanted to find Natalie. 

It's the supernatural vs. rational discussion playing out on the show. Doesn't matter that they all had reasons for being there. It arranged them to be there.

 

6 hours ago, AstridM said:

I didn’t feel like I needed to see any more details about how they chose the card. The Queen of Hearts is well known from Alice in Wonderland as the figure who orders executions, and I just surmised that Shauna added the part with Jackie’s necklace on the spur of the moment. It wasn’t meant to be a chase/hunt, but Travis telling Natalie to run made it one. I do wish they had shown where that Queen of Hearts card came from though, as they had discussed earlier that the deck had no queens.

Me neither. What would they add? They all make intuitive sense. The necklace was passed back and forth and Lottie took it off Jackie before she was sacrificed, so they'd do the same for Nat. There's only one queen card. Explaining it doesn't really help since we all get it.

4 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

As a Lost fan, it sort of annoys me that this show isn't getting any of the shit Lost did. Although, at this point, I guess Lost wasn't getting it either. If this show actually tries to go 5 seasons they probably will too because it's clear to me they don't have enough to fill that and will just be putting a lot of filler in. I just hope it's mostly filler I enjoy like the stupid Adam murder stuff this season.

Lost was setting up mysteries it claimed it was going to solve and didn't, then kept throwing more stuff in--time travel, frozen donkey wheels, dharma cults, hatches, numbers, Jacob etc. This show doesn't have mysteries and plot twists--every small step they take towards submission to the forest god in either timeline is a major event. I think what you may be calling filler is what the actual show is and was always supposed to be. There's dream sequences because one of its central interests is that truth is subjective. 

5 hours ago, Chaos Theory said:

Jeff telling Callie about the baby Shauna lost in the wilderness was all kinds of unexpectedly heartbreaking.  

 

Agreed--and I think this is ultimately why that whole storyline is important. And it was also another example of the show being straightforward when people theorize it's going to be overly complicated. A lot of people thought Shauna ought to have been lying in her diaries and Jeff didn't know about the baby etc., and ultimately yes, he knows. His dream shows that he does have fears about the woman he's married to, especially lately, but he also feels responsible for what she went through.

[SeanC]

9 hours ago, Lila82 said:

The writers said they intentionally featured Shauna's domestic life more heavily because they like Warren Cole and Sarah Desjardins so much, and it was a mistake. We lost precious screen time that should have been devoted to showing what was happening in the wilderness.

(Adult) Shauna needs screentime; if that particular stuff wasn't being shown, she'd be shown doing something else.

Quote

I loathe the tell, not show approach to storytelling, because it makes me fill in the pieces, which makes me speculate on the characters' motivations when it should be the actual writers telling us who and what their characters are.

We've been shown plenty over the course of this season. The gnawing affect of hunger has been a constant theme for the past seven episodes, and we even that things like the multi-episode twist with Akilah's mouse that shows just how much it's been warping the characters.

[sistermagpie]

Something that just occurred to me--when Mari sees the blood coming out of the walls (a la The Shining) does she scream something about how "they're dead?" I wonder if she's channeling something like the cabin haunted by the experience of Cabin Daddy and his family, and that this is also why she's been hearing the dripping. Mari may be closest to Lottie, despite not seeming that spiritual to start with?

[Anela]

That's something I meant to ask earlier: we haven't seen Jason Ritter yet, and he was said to have signed on this season. So, will he be on next week? 

[sistermagpie]

17 minutes ago, Anela said:

That's something I meant to ask earlier: we haven't seen Jason Ritter yet, and he was said to have signed on this season. So, will he be on next week? 

I really suspect he's going to be playing Cabin Daddy in flashbacks and maybe we'll get some next week? But that's not a spoiler. I could be wrong!

[Black Knight]

I agree with others that Travis must never have been told the truth about what happened to Javi. Everyone out there on the frozen lake chose to stand there and watch him drown, so while Natalie would hurt Travis most on a personal level, they're all guilty and I can't imagine that he'd overlook that. And these girls aren't stupid. I'm sure they figured out that nobody should tell him the truth. I keep thinking of that one flashback Adult Natalie had to the last time she and Adult Travis had sex. He looked at her in a way that I can't imagine he would have if he knew the truth.

I really wonder if Ben will decide to just hole up in Javi's shelter. Maybe he'll crutch back just in time to see them bringing Javi's body back, and just nope out and head back to the shelter. He would be an interesting wild card if so. I've always wondered if the survivors left someone behind alive in the woods. If Ben went full hermit, he would be a real possibility.

I was reading Autostraddle's recap of this episode, and it reminded me that Tai has more motive than just Van's psychological well-being when she declares that it can't be Lottie they sacrifice: While Tai does not seem to buy fully into the hocus pocus, she did acknowledge to Shauna in an earlier episode that she had stopped sleepwalking once she started attending Lottie's gatherings. And then in this episode, with Lottie out of commission, she saw the Other Tai and was feeling very unmoored and unsafe again. So she had a reason relating to herself, not just Van, for wanting to keep Lottie alive and sacrifice someone else.

I like the way this show manages to make the most logical thing a surprise, in this episode Akilah's pet Nugget. I'd been worrying about that poor cute mouse, but it just makes so much sense given the lack of food that Nugget had died long ago and Akilah just found his body and held onto it because she was starving and also emotionally traumatized and in need of some sort of comfort. Tai again ends up the one to deliver a brutal reality check, like she did with Shauna when she caught Shauna with Jackie's body. (I miss Ella Purnell. I hope they show her in the final episode this season, even just for a second.)

[Shorty186]

I got the sense that it was “Other Tai” that said Lottie couldn’t be the one who died. It just looked to me like there was a shift in her face before she sat up. And I can just see Adult Taissa being all, “What do you mean? I never suggested that we sacrifice each other!”

I was so sure that Javi was going to be the one to pull the Queen. But I guess I was ultimately right about the group eating Javi.* Although I also thought whatever Coach Ben was doing was going to inadvertently get him killed and then his death would have been what saved Natalie. Damn, if I was Adult Natalie, I would be pissed at everyone there except Lottie since she’s the only one who didn’t try to murder her. Again, Van had those murderous eyes. I can’t tell if that means something or that’s just Liv Hewson’s acting.

I’m calling the season finale cliffhanger. All six drink and it cuts to black before we find out who got the poison. I wish we’d gotten more of Adult Van this season. Obviously we know the OG 4 and Adult Lottie got tons of screen time, but if Van’s dying (either from cancer or the poison) I would’ve liked to know the adult version more. There is still the last episode, but if they make it heavy on Van, that would indicate all the more that she’s the one to die.

*This is definitely more twisted than my version. Javi was safe, but Travis wanted him to help Natalie, which he tried, only to end up dying for it. And Nat’s caught between allowing herself to be killed or letting an innocent person die. So tragic, yet so good.

Edited May 20, 2023 by Shorty186

[Anela]

Someone over on reddit, speculated that Van sent the postcards, and that she was in one of Sammy's drawings. That would go back to something I wondered about: if someone else sacrificed the dog, for her. I don't know, though. 

[AstridM]

10 hours ago, Anela said:

Damn, they really wanted to kill her! 
noo, they let javi drown? I’m crying.  She’s right, they shouldn’t have survived. That poor kid.

this must be why the one actress said that we would hate them. It works for me, anyway. They all stood around and let that boy drown.

All while Lottie was injured and said they could use her body if she died. 

7 hours ago, Anela said:

As soon as Lottie saw the Antler Queen as her therapist, she should have found a way to talk to a real one, and get her pills. Instead, she's taken the deep dive into the wilderness BS. I hoped they wouldn't go there as adults, but I suppose it was inevitable. Just to amp up the drama. 

Going by the preview

  Reveal spoiler

If someone else dies, like the cop that Walter is likely drawing up there to kill (I think), maybe that will keep Lottie from letting someone else die. But then she's also covering up a murder of a cop, if that happens. 

I wouldn't blame Ben if he goes and hides in that tree for as long as possible. Nat tells someone they don't belong there, and that's probably him.

 

Lottie should’ve been the one to die. The more days that pass, the angrier I get about this.

[Chaos Theory]

This is just my personal opinion:  but I think a lot of people are getting confused because they are expecting confusing conflicting plots and making them up in their heads..”wouldn’t this be cool if this happened?”   Heck I am doing it myself.   I was sure the first hunt would be a stranger and there had to be someone in the woods and that Javi’s plot would be leading them to killing someone who might have saved them.   But I am also  with Javi being the first to die because his death is just so tragic.  They were all so excited to see him alive.   Being alive was both Travis and Nat’s  redemption.  Keeping him alive would mean hope for their budding relationship.  Javi dying in Nat’a place just cancels out any hope for a relationship between the two that is not fucked up.     And it was all done while Lotti was incapacitated.   Say what you want about her mental health but she does keep the group on a steady keel.  The moment she is out of the picture they go flying off the handle into their worst instincts and then try to justify it with Lottie’s religion.     This is not a bit supernatural it is rational in an irrational way.?  Right now the only supernatural thing going on is coach Ben and the tree stump.

As for Walter there is no way he is turning on Misty.  That makes no sense either.   It is far more likely he still thinks she murdered Adam and with Adams remains being found he will do what he needs to to protect her.   There has been nothing in the story to say otherwise.

 

 

 

Edited May 20, 2023 by Chaos Theory

[peachmangosteen]

11 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

This show doesn't have mysteries and plot twists ...

It definitely does though.

I think the writers are trying to have it both ways in a lot of aspects and I find it annoying. But then I find literally all showrunners annoying as hell and I should really never read anything they say lol.

[JenE4]

This was some real “The Lottery” shit right here. These kids would have likely read that story in school, so it makes sense to me that they all would have went along with it without question, just like Shirley Jackson’s townsfolk—just a necessary tradition for a good harvest.

So last week when they panned out and we saw the mysterious person hieroglyphic laid out on the ground of the compound, I was curious whether Lottie created that (like a man made crop circle) as part of bringing the wilderness cult to her cult. But now that Ben also mapped out the same person hieroglyphic of the land and followed it to find the what I’m going to call a fairy bunker. (My daughter and I have a thing if we’re out in nature and spot perfect little areas, like a mossy area near a creek, where we imagine fairies would live.) I think that there’s something “special” (or ominous/dangerous) about the location of the compound that has the same background connection as the wilderness. When Lottie talks about something bringing them all together, like the spirit of the wilderness, I’m starting to take her literally. Does this mean I’ve officially become a member of the Lottie cult? Lol. I don’t think she has any “powers” but I do think she’s the conduit to whatever this “thing” is that they are all feeling. The fact that she was terrified of having all of these visions come back made me realize that she did not make the hieroglyphic person crop circle in the compound—it’s just there like it was in the wilderness. But somehow between last episode and this episode she did a 180 and rather than running from the past, she realizes they need to lean into it entirely to break the hold its had on them. Yet, the wilderness spirit isn’t going to just be like, K thanks for one last sacrifice, you’re free from the burden now! It’s starting the whole cycle over again.

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, peachmangosteen said:

It definitely does though.

I think the writers are trying to have it both ways in a lot of aspects and I find it annoying. But then I find literally all showrunners annoying as hell and I should really never read anything they say lol.

It has things that we haven't found out yet, but I don't see where it's a show based around plot twists and mysteries that aren't solved. Weird things happen, but just in a "sometimes weird things happen" way with no explanation promised. Like we might never find out exactly how Javi surived (for a while, RIP) but we got a hidden bunker with signs of life in it. A lot of the things the audience considers mysteries are things the characters already know. When I try to think of plot twists I get things like Adam turning out to not be the blackmailer because it was Jeff, and that was just a straight mystery story where one suspect seemed right but then it was really somebody else. The Travis situation also got a straightforward explanation.

For the most part every reveal has been led up to pretty logically, imo, too much so to be a shocking twist. All the complicated theories that insist whatever we've been shown is too simple to be true don't work out. People are probably still clinging to the alleged mystery of who sent the postcard even after we finally, after a whole season, got a reference to them that just doubled down on the original straightforward explanation: Jeff sent them. We're getting things that straightforwardly lead toward the story teaser in the pilot.

I avoid showrunner interviews in general since they usually are annoying as hell, but the only thing the show feels like it's trying to have both ways is that is the supernatural vs. rational explanation, but that's the whole idea of the show, so as it should be. It's not a mystery to be solved, it's how humans interpret the world. Javi's "she" isn't necessarily a real person in the concrete sense. Basically: it's trippy, not twisty.

1 minute ago, JenE4 said:

The fact that she was terrified of having all of these visions come back made me realize that she did not make the hieroglyphic person crop circle in the compound—it’s just there like it was in the wilderness.

Lottie's put that symbol all over the compound and even has people wearing it around their necks, so I don't see why she wouldn't have made the crop circle too.

[peachmangosteen]

The answers to the mysteries being predictable/straightforward doesn’t mean this show doesn’t have mysteries. It clearly does.

It really is giving me Lost vibes where in the writers are more interested in the character study than the mysteries but they put the mysteries in because they want the fan engagement and buzz that comes with it. They also imo pretty clearly do not have this whole thing planned out. They have some big, broad ideas and that’s it, which I think was basically how it went with Lost.

[sistermagpie]

31 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

The answers to the mysteries being predictable/straightforward doesn’t mean this show doesn’t have mysteries. It clearly does.

 

Yes, I shouldn't have said it doesn't have them since obviously it does have them mysteries. I meant it in the context of it being, well, Lost and shows like that where the overarching point of the show is some mystery - a puzzlebox show. Because I assumed that's the only thing that would be causing a problem with what the showrunners plan was. The kind of thing that inspires people to make theories and predict people and things being Not What They Seem. Not the kind of mysteries and twists you have on, say, Grantchester where somebody killed the grumpy shopkeeper and it looked like it was the guy having an affair with his wife but then it turned out to be the church organist who seemed so friendly.

 

[peachmangosteen]

4 minutes ago, sistermagpie said:

The kind of thing that inspires people to make theories and predict people and things being Not What They Seem.

That is exactly what this show is doing. And the writers actively encourage it so it’s something they are purposefully going for.

This reminded me, someone in this episode said Jeff sent the postcards (maybe Natalie) and so I guess that is possibly confirmation of that but honestly it could still just be what they assume. I should rewatch the scene where Shauna talks about the postcards to Jeff because I saw someone say he had a look on his face like he didn’t know what she was talking about. Does anyone know what episode that is?

[AstridM]

Imo, Jeff absolutely sent the postcards. Some people feel that wasn’t made clear enough, and simply won’t let go of it. I don’t think we’ll hear anything more about it. 🤷‍♀️

[sistermagpie]

15 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

That is exactly what this show is doing. And the writers actively encourage it so it’s something they are purposefully going for.

Whatever the writers do outside the show to encourage people to do what they like to enjoy the show doesn't change what's on the show, though, and I don't see what on the show is encouraging me to think of any theories at all. I see other people doing it because they like it, but nothing on the show demands it. There are a lot of times where it intentionally puts me in the pov of characters whose interpretations are subjective and whose minds could be playing tricks on them--so tricking me as a viewer would be counterproductive.

15 minutes ago, peachmangosteen said:

This reminded me, someone in this episode said Jeff sent the postcards (maybe Natalie) and so I guess that is possibly confirmation of that but honestly it could still just be what they assume. I should rewatch the scene where Shauna talks about the postcards to Jeff because I saw someone say he had a look on his face like he didn’t know what she was talking about. Does anyone know what episode that is?

That's exactly what I mean. Of course they *could* whip out some unknown person sending the postcards just as Adam could be revealed to be a member of Lottie's cult etc., but from what I saw on the show there's no reason to be coming up with theories about the postcard sender. Everyone on the show assumes the postcards and the text were part of the same blackmail plot, Shauna not getting one was emphasized as a clue about Jeff, so not so far-fetched as people with other theories about it claim it to be. It was never highlighted as an open question after that. Most of the clues that it couldn't be him come from outside the show (and sometimes imagining it was in the show).

There is no scene where Shauna talks to Jeff about postcards. She accuses him of blackmailing them and he admits to that. Then in this ep Natalie asks if Jeff sent the postcards and blackmailed them and in the next scene Shauna's explaining why she let them continue to think it was Adam. 

 

[peachmangosteen]

IMO if the writers didn’t intend for the show to be a ‘mystery box’/for people to theorize then they would just say exactly what the symbol is, they wouldn’t have had Javi mention a ‘she’ and draw all those pictures, they wouldn’t be doing what they’re doing with Dark Tai, they wouldn’t have shown that random guy in Jackie’s dream, etc. 

It’s only season 2 so there’s still time for them to explicitly answer some of the still lingering things like the postcards as well as the obvious big mysteries. It’s just that if they don’t, I want the critics to bitch about it like they did with Lost lol.

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, peachmangosteen said:

IMO if the writers didn’t intend for the show to be a ‘mystery box’/for people to theorize then they would just say exactly what the symbol is, they wouldn’t have had Javi mention a ‘she’ and draw all those pictures, they wouldn’t be doing what they’re doing with Dark Tai, they wouldn’t have shown that random guy in Jackie’s dream, etc. 

MMV, but I don't think any of these things are being set out as mysteries with promises of solutions. Their meaning is the meaning that the characters project onto them. The woods are deep and dark and mysterious and people have been drawing spiritualities from them forever. It's meant, imo, to stay in the space in between a rational explanation and a supernatural one. I think psychic abilities and hauntings may genuine exist in this universe--just as many believe they do in the real world, but the show's had characters explicitly talk about things like how rituals aquire meaning, shown peoples' perceptions making things real, people expressing feelings with symbols taken from the real experiences or facts and distorted. It's always leaving the door open for a real presence on the forest without introducing us to it. A definitive rational or supernatural explanation would completely betray the point imo. (If it was even accepted.)

That's the exact opposite of Lost, which over and over explicitly showed that this island had specific properties that were magic/sci-fi that different people had been studying and trying to understand and harness for hundreds of years. Everything on Lost came back to the island--until the writers got caught and tried to pretend it was ever about "the friends they made along the way." YJ started with these women deep into their own forest religion and asked how they came to be that way. Lost asking whether the island's powers came from gods or science fiction still acknowledged they were there.

It Chooses had Natalie and Lottie each having different explanations for why their lives were shitty. Lottie was interpeting her own experiences to mean not only that the forest god was real, but that it was demanding a human sacrifice to make their lives get better. Nat thought they just needed to start facing what they did in the forest head on. Shauna, iirc, seemed to suggest that the horrible things they did didn't really happen or else the stuff they believed that made them do it didn't happen.

Meanwhile, in the past we have Javi falling through ice, the others choosing not to save him and then Van announcing that The Wilderness had chosen. It's an in between situation where, to quote that book on folk horror I was reading, "The fantastical becomes so absorbed into the real that the two are unnervingly difficult to tell apart." 

1 hour ago, peachmangosteen said:

It’s only season 2 so there’s still time for them to explicitly answer some of the still lingering things like the postcards as well as the obvious big mysteries. It’s just that if they don’t, I want the critics to bitch about it like they did with Lost lol.

Nothing on the show suggests the postcards are a lingering thing that I can see, but what are the obvious big mysteries they're supposed to be solving? Because I honestly don't see any. For instance, whatever reason Cabin Daddy or whoever had for carving that symbol on the trees doesn't matter at all. What matter is that it was there, and became part of everyone's mental landscape. Of course some things may get more explanation--there may be a concrete identity for Javi's "she" that we learn. But things like Dark Tai and the guy in Jackie's/Shauna's last dream don't seem to require an explanation. Dark Tai is part of Tai. They found a dead guy in the cabin and now Jackie is dying too.

Edited May 20, 2023 by sistermagpie

[Anela]

6 hours ago, peachmangosteen said:

It definitely does though.

I think the writers are trying to have it both ways in a lot of aspects and I find it annoying. But then I find literally all showrunners annoying as hell and I should really never read anything they say lol.

Yeah, they need to pick a story line, and go with it, instead of trying to play to it all, to keep some people happy. 

I'm still firmly Team Rational. I don't think Van is up to anything, but you never know. If Sammy did see her outside, or around the house, it wouldn't have anything to do with some wilderness spirit. If Van or someone else had sacrificed the dog, it would just mean that she believed. We've seen Tai do things as "other Tai" though, and she automatically decided that she had done it, so I'm going with that.

Edited May 20, 2023 by Anela