news ‘Yellowjackets’ Season 3 Writer’s Room Lasted for a Day — Then the Strike Happened

The writers behind Showtime’s “Yellowjackets” had a very brief time back in the beehive.

The team behind the mystery thriller paused work for Season 3 following the commencement of the Writers Guild of America’s strike — after beginning the writer’s room of the season just the day before.

Ashley Lyle, who created the acclaimed show with her husband Bart Nickerson and co-showruns with him and Jonathan Lisco, shared that the writer’s room would pause work on Monday night, following the WGA’s official announcement of a work stoppage, after meeting for the first time earlier that day.

“Well, we had exactly one day in the ‘YellowJackets’ S3 writers’ room,” Lyle wrote on Twitter. “It was amazing, and creatively invigorating, and so much fun, and I’m very excited to get back to it as soon as the WGA gets a fair deal. #1u #unionstrong.”

IndieWire has reached out to Lyle for comment.

The WGA strike has been anticipated for months, as the May 1 expiration of the guild’s current three year contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has loomed. A strike authorization vote was issued in April after negotiations between the two guilds failed, and the strike was officially announced after the AMPTP failed to listen to proposals regarding core issues like minimum staffing of shows and regulation of AI-generated material.

Under the terms of the strike, all productions will halt writing. This most prominently effects late night and variety series, with most talk shows already announcing a hiatus. Shows that have already completed the script process, like “House of the Dragon,” will continue to move forward in production.

“Yellowjackets,” which premiered in November 2021, is currently airing its sophomore season, with the final episode scheduled to premiere May 26 on streaming followed by a May 28 linear premiere. Set in 1996 and 2021, the show follows a high school girls soccer team that gets stranded in the Canadian wilderness after a plane crash, switching focus between their time in the woods as teenagers and their lives as adults two decades later. The show has been widely acclaimed since its premiere, and is Showtime’s biggest hit by a considerable margin; the channel gave the show an early Season 3 renewal before Season 2 premiered.

Melanie Lynskey, Juliette Lewis, Christina Ricci, Tawny Cypress, Lauren Ambrose, Simone Kessell, Sophie Nélisse, Jasmin Savoy Brown, Sophie Thatcher, Samantha Hanratty, Courtney Eaton, Liv Hewson, Steven Krueger, Warren Kole, and Kevin Alves star in “Yellowjackets.” Lyle, Nickerson and Lisco executive produce with Drew Comins, Ameni Rozsa, Sarah L. Thompson, and Karyn Kusama. Entertainment One produces the series for Showtime.
 
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