# Digestif (Yellowjackets)
"Digestif" is the third episode of the second season of the American drama series *Yellowjackets*, released in early April 2023 on Showtime.[1](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review-digestif/) • [2](https://yellowjackets.fandom.com/wiki/Digestif) Written by Sarah L. Thompson and Ameni Rozsa and directed by Jeffrey W. Byrd, it follows the episode "[Edible Complex](https://www.edgepedia.org/edible-complex)", in which the stranded survivors consume the body of their captain Jackie.[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26676793/fullcredits/) • [4](https://time.com/6267284/yellowjackets-cannibalism-jackie/) The title, a digestif being a drink served after a heavy meal, reads as a direct reference to that event.
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Series and position | Season 2, episode 3 of *Yellowjackets*; also numbered 203[5](https://www.autostraddle.com/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-recap/) • [2](https://yellowjackets.fandom.com/wiki/Digestif) |
| Release | Early April 2023 on Showtime; recaps and reviews published April 7–9, 2023[1](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review-digestif/) |
| Credits | Directed by Jeffrey W. Byrd; written by Sarah L. Thompson and Ameni Rozsa; series created by Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26676793/fullcredits/) |
| Lead cast | Melanie Lynskey (Shauna), Tawny Cypress (Taissa), Sophie Nélisse (Teen Shauna), Jasmin Savoy Brown (Teen Taissa), Sophie Thatcher (Teen Natalie), Samantha Hanratty (Teen Misty), Steven Krueger (Coach Ben)[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26676793/fullcredits/) |
| Tone | A quieter, character-driven hour without the major revelations of the season's first two episodes[1](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review-digestif/) |
## Context within the series
*Yellowjackets* runs on two timelines: in the late 1990s a high-school girls' soccer team survives a plane crash in the Canadian wilderness for 19 months, while in the present day the adult survivors reckon with what happened there, including rumors of cannibalism.[6](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/yellowjackets-review-sky-uk-b1966892.html) The second episode of season 2, "Edible Complex", resolved one of the show's central questions: after about two months of hunger, the team consumes Jackie's body, which had been frozen since her death in an early-winter snowfall and was essentially cooked when a snow drift fell onto her burning funeral pyre. Only Coach Ben, the sole adult among the teens, refrains from joining.[4](https://time.com/6267284/yellowjackets-cannibalism-jackie/)
"Digestif" opens on the aftermath. Its first image is Jackie's remaining hand, brittle bone and dripping blood, as Coach Ben recalls with a glitchy, VCR-like static what he witnessed the night before.[5](https://www.autostraddle.com/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-recap/) Teen Taissa, who was in a trance during the feast, is overcome with disgust when she sees the body.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) Teen Natalie takes the lead and proposes carrying Jackie's remains back to the plane wreckage, to be buried when the ground thaws.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/)
## Plot
**In the wilderness timeline.** A flashback shows Coach Ben spending his last nights with Paul, his boyfriend, before departing with the team; in the present of the 1996 timeline he has grown weak and slips into a fugue-like state.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) • [8](https://horrorobsessive.com/2023/04/09/yellowjackets-s2e3-digestif/) Natalie confronts Lottie for giving Shauna a blanket stitched with the team's sinister symbol, and Shauna suddenly bleeds from the nose.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) The episode's most striking image follows: a pack of birds falls dead around the cabin, and the girls place them on the porch for Lottie to bless before eating them.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) Lottie later finds all the bees in her hives dead, with blood inside the hive structures, and an acolyte telling her "il veut du sang" (he wants the blood); she realizes this was a hallucination.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/)
The episode deepens the show's *Lost* parallels, with a growing fissure in the camp between survivors who gravitate toward Lottie's faith-based reading of the fallen birds as a gift and those aligned with Natalie and Taissa's more pragmatic approach.[9](https://butwhytho.net/2023/04/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review/)
**In the present-day timeline.** Natalie is back at Lottie's communion grounds, observing the purple-robed community and its leader. Lottie has Natalie look inward at her unprocessed feelings, then invites Lisa, the girl Natalie attacked with a fork, to describe how that attack felt; Lottie offers Lisa a knife and the option to hurt Natalie back, and Lisa decides against it.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) The episode also expands Misty's backstory, portraying her affectations and self-presentation as a kind of performance learned over a lifetime.[10](https://www.salon.com/2023/04/07/yellowjackets-recap-s2-ep3-digestif/) Shauna, meanwhile, reckons with her marriage after the affair and killing she hid from her husband Jeff, and the episode includes the team's twisted baby shower for her.[7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/)
## Reception
Critical response was broadly positive. Reviewers consistently characterized it as a slower hour: Den of Geek noted that it contains no jaw-dropping revelations like the season's first two episodes but instead offers insight into the characters' darker psychology, while The Review Geek rated it 3.5 out of 5 and judged the past timeline more atmospheric and interesting than the present-day one.[1](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review-digestif/) • [7](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/) [Bloody Disgusting](https://www.edgepedia.org/bloody-disgusting) read the episode as grappling with the psychological fallout of the survivors' cannibalism while suggesting that the land's supernatural strength is growing.[11](https://bloody-disgusting.com/reviews/3757549/yellowjackets-season-2-review-episode-3-digestif/)
## References
1. [Yellowjackets Season 2 Episode 3 Review: Digestif, Den of Geek](https://www.denofgeek.com/tv/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review-digestif/)
2. [Digestif, Yellowjackets Wiki](https://yellowjackets.fandom.com/wiki/Digestif)
3. ["Yellowjackets" Digestif (TV Episode 2023) – Full cast & crew, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt26676793/fullcredits/)
4. [Yellowjackets Finally Went There. Let's Talk About It, Time](https://time.com/6267284/yellowjackets-cannibalism-jackie/)
5. ["Yellowjackets" Episode 203 Recap: Fear Alchemized Into Desire, Autostraddle](https://www.autostraddle.com/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-recap/)
6. [Yellowjackets review: This is Desperate Housewives with feral youths and cannibalism, The Independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/yellowjackets-review-sky-uk-b1966892.html)
7. [Yellowjackets – Season 2 Episode 3 "Digestif" Recap & Review, The Review Geek](https://www.thereviewgeek.com/yellowjackets-s2e3review/)
8. [Yellowjackets S2E3: "Digestif", Horror Obsessive](https://horrorobsessive.com/2023/04/09/yellowjackets-s2e3-digestif/)
9. [REVIEW: 'Yellowjackets,' Season 2 Episode 3 – "Digestif", But Why Tho?](https://butwhytho.net/2023/04/yellowjackets-season-2-episode-3-review/)
10. ["We're all made of lies": "Yellowjackets" gives us more of Misty's origin story in "Digestif", Salon](https://www.salon.com/2023/04/07/yellowjackets-recap-s2-ep3-digestif/)
11. ["Yellowjackets" Season 2 Review – Episode 3 Deepens the Supernatural Mysteries, Bloody Disgusting](https://bloody-disgusting.com/reviews/3757549/yellowjackets-season-2-review-episode-3-digestif/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Seasons, episodes, and installments › Episodes and serial chapters › Individual episode articles › General episode articles › Horror and thriller episodes*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license