How ‘Yellowjackets’ Delivered One Of The Most Accurate Depictions Of Menstruation In Years
Periods don't stop in life-or-death situations.
If a bunch of teenage girls were stranded in the wilderness for 19 months, menstruation would be a significant consideration for them — but while most survival dramas brush over how periods would be tackled in demanding situations, Yellowjackets doesn’t shy away from depicting the necessary logistics.
— Warning: Minor spoilers for Yellowjackets ahead. —
The Showtime TV series follows an amateur high school soccer team in the late ’90s whose plane crashes into an Ontario forest on their way to a national competition. While sworn to secrecy as suburban adults, flashbacks reveal the horrific and gritty ordeals the characters undertake to ensure their survival — from the extremities of ritual sacrifice to the mundanity of period rags.
Blood Hive
In episode five, the main characters have finally been in each other’s company for long enough that their cycles sync up. While still holding onto hope that they’ll be found and rescued, they are forced to get resourceful to pass the time.
Makeshift pads are fashioned from torn up, salvaged clothing that survived the wreck. The girls take turns stewing them in pots, stirring the scraps with a stick to sterilise and reuse again, without censoring the deep red hues that bubble in boiling water. “Bloody soldiers on the left, and breakfast on the right, okay? Don’t mess them up like Travis did,” joked teammate Akilah about one of the three guys who survived the crash with them.
The scenes are short but there, and not only add to the realism of the situation, but set up vital parts of the plot. Travis accuses his co-hunter Nat of scaring off prey with her menstrual scent, and the naive justifications and banter of the teenage boy star sets the foundation of a long-term relationship between the two.
Meanwhile, team leader Jackie groans and pouts when prodded awake in the morning, complaining of cramps as she begrudgingly wriggles off her mattress. A few hours later, her best friend Shauna dips a rag in the blood of a butchered deer to mask her pregnancy from sleeping with Jackie’s boyfriend the night before their fateful flight.
Suspended Belief
What separates Yellowjackets from others in its genre — both fictional and in real life — is that the indiscriminate timing of menstruation is addressed. Audiences aren’t left to wonder if Katniss had to beg a sponsor to parachute a pack of pads into the arena like in the Hunger Games, or how periods aren’t a bigger factor in The Walking Dead.
“I was ending my period the first day that we started, so then I actually had my period again there,” explained former reality TV contestant Lauren-Ashley Beck from Survivor: Island of the Idols off-air. Having used her tampons from her first cycle on set, she had to beg producers to give her more, and told Insider it took a full day to receive the supplies.
Showing periods, and giving thought to what the practicalities of having one are, normalises a very natural occurrence…
Other cohorts explained that they didn’t fully feel ‘clean’ with their limited period product stock, how PMS affected their group, and how they feared being around sharks around their time of month — comments that could go far if actually broadcast on the show itself, rather than ignore that they happen at all.
The conversation around period representation in predicaments aligns with how, despite being in trying circumstances, most TV shows and movies depict women in SciFi, apocalypse, and wilderness survival environments as always looking put together — as if razors and blowout brushes would be a priority scavenge in a life-or-death situation, but menstrual cups wouldn’t.
Period Representation
One of the closest examples to Yellowjackets is the 1980 film Blue Lagoon, where two cousins are shipwrecked, and forced to navigate a wild terrain as pre-teens. Protagonist Emmeline is horrified to discover her first period while swimming, and doesn’t know what it is or means.
“I’m just impressed that a survival movie actually touched upon the topic of menstruation,” a user commented under a clip of the scene. “That’s usually one of those unanswered questions writers just kind of hope you won’t think about.”
The media and entertainment industries have come far in depicting menstruation in the last few years — from a groundbreaking period sex scene in I May Destroy You, to influencers videoing real menstrual blood on TikTok. Showing periods, and giving thought to what the practicalities of having one are, not only normalises a very natural occurrence, but validates the experiences of women and people who menstruate no matter what’s happening in their life.
It paints people as they are in actuality — not just in a way that makes others feel comfortable.