‘Yellowjackets’ Leans In to Savagery

Four years ago, Ashley Lyle read an article in the trades about a planned remake of William Golding’s “Lord of the Flies,” the 1954 boys-gone-wild classic about prep school lads stranded on an island. This version would gender-swap girls for boys. Lyle, a writer and producer, read the comments, many of them skeptical that girls would descend into such barbarism.

On a video call from the Los Angeles home that she shares with her husband and producing partner, Bart Nickerson, Lyle recalled one man’s comment, which read, “What are they going to do? Collaborate to death?”

And she recalled what she immediately thought in response: “You were never a teenage girl, sir.”

Lyle was. She remembers that time vividly, describing the relationships she formed then as “probably the most important in my life.” (She paused here to apologize to her husband, who joined her on the call.) She also remembers how ferocious those relationships could be.

“There was a girl in my high school who poisoned another girl’s food for fun,” she said. “Only showing girls getting along is not painting a full picture.”

So on dog walks, during hikes and over dinner, Lyle and Nickerson conceived “Yellowjackets,” a show that would paint that picture in some very vibrant colors. (They are co-showrunners, alongside Jonathan Lisco.) Set in 1996 and in the present, “Yellowjackets,” which premieres Sunday on Showtime, follows a high school girls’ soccer team whose plane crashes en route to a tournament. The 2021 sequences follow the survivors as they negotiate middle age, still burdened by the past.