John Reynolds on the ‘Yellowjackets’ Finale Twist and Fans’ Hatred for His Character

Right now, the worst person on television isn’t Tom Sandoval or Tom Schwartz from Vanderpump Rules. Or any of the Roy siblings on Succession. It’s Detective Matt Saracusa on Season 2 of Showtime’s Yellowjackets.

Played with oily aplomb by 31-year-old actor John Reynolds, when we meet Saracusa, he’s “Jay,” a good-looking hipster-y guy that Callie (Sarah Desjardins), Shauna’s (Melanie Lynskey) teen daughter, meets at a bar in Episode 2. Reynolds has mostly been known for playing hapless beta males on Max’s excellent comedy-mystery Search Party or in the film Save Yourselves! At first Jay seems like he could easily be another Reynolds-esque character, until it’s revealed that he’s been brought in to aid Kevyn’s (Alex Wyndham) investigation into the disappearance of Adam Martin (Peter Gadiot), which has been unfolding since Season 1.

While the audience knows that Shauna and her Yellowjackets are behind Adam’s “disappearance,” by way of Jeff’s (Warren Kole) blackmail, Kevyn’s timidness around investigating Shauna’s involvement drops Saracusa right into the investigation.

(Warning: Spoilers ahead for the Yellowjackets Season 2 finale.)

It’s quickly made evident that Saracusa’s ethical compass doesn’t exist, as he begins to court underage Callie to get information about Shauna and Adam until Callie, very much her mother’s daughter, catches on. The 31-year-old actor previously played law enforcement on Stranger Things, and jokes about continuing to play bumbling police types. “I think it’s particularly fun to see an inept authority figure. My humor background lends itself to that, because why else does everyone think I should be playing a detective? This is the fifth time I’ve done this,” he tells The Daily Beast’s Obsessed, laughing.

But playing straight-up villains is a new frontier for him. Last year, he portrayed an established comedian on The Sex Lives of College Girls who sleeps with Bela (Amrit Kaur), a college student who is attempting to get into comedy. While his Detective Saracosa doesn’t reach that level of intimacy with Callie, his actions throughout Season 2 make him equally reprehensible. What begins as incredibly queasy evolves into downright despicable behavior. Reynolds secretes ickiness while the Adam Martin investigation veers into gross territory, as he leads Callie into a relationship only to investigate her mother. But Reynolds is relishing his Bad Guy era as Saracusa. “Everyone online is mad at my character, which is very fun. So yeah, I’m enjoying it. Change of pace.”

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If you were familiar with Reynolds before Yellowjackets, it’s likely because of his performance as Drew from Search Party, Alia Shawkat’s listless boyfriend and eventual partner-in-crime. It’s the type of role he’s become known for and something that’s mirrored in his own comedy, which he describes as “my exploration of inept, insecure men.”

He recently released a short film called Modern Man that he wrote and was directed by Guy Kozak, about “an insecure, blowhard, romantic type who is obsessed with movies,” as he describes it. It’s wildly funny and has echoes of Saracusa (it was written before Reynolds took the Yellowjackets role).

Reynolds describes the Yellowjackets set as an incredibly warm and welcoming environment, which helped allow him to work with creators Ashley Lyle and Bart Nicholson to bring Saracusa off the script page.

“I spent a lot of time on television playing the affable boyfriend and wanting a change of pace. This show’s been cool because initially I was only sent the bar scene,” he says. “I had to infer what was even happening. Then reading some scenes with some misogynistic language, or these explosions of joy with him finding the condom. It was a gradual process where I was like, ‘I understand this now.’ Even on set, there are multiple times where someone’s like, ‘Give us a more subdued take.’ And then be like, ‘Ramp it up, do a more oily take here.’

“There’s this line in the script where Kevyn tells Matt that he’s seen The French Connection too many times, and I really ran with that,” he continues. “My character thinks he's in a cop movie from the ’70s.”

While any inferences that Reynolds made with that information was intentional, Saracusa’s wilting mullet hairstyle and bushy mustache was a happy coincidence, because Reynolds was already sporting that…interesting look for another role he was going to be filming.

“I was supposed to be doing another job at the same time that took place in the ’80s. I had to have a big mustache and a mullet, so we established it on Yellowjackets, too,” he says. “And then the other job couldn’t make the schedule work. So I didn’t even shoot the other job. In hindsight, I would've never done that because it does look disgusting at times. But at the same time, it fits this antiquated ’90s vibe [of Yellowjackets].”

Reynolds does like how, as the season plays out, Saracusa looks more and more “disgusting.” In his finale scene with Callie, when he pops out of the woods while she’s holding a gun, Reynolds describes Saracusa as the “big bad wolf.”

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Desjardins has been Reynolds’s main scene partner throughout his Season 2 arc—one that plunged into just how grotesque Saracosa is willing to behave, and one that breaks Callie out of the dreaded angsty teen storyline. And they’ve easily been able to create that dynamic together despite their, at times, uncomfortable scenes.

“It’s been fun to see the audience change their minds on Callie and be like, ‘Oh, Callie's like Shauna.’ And everyone being, ‘I hope Callie murders this man,’” Reynolds says.

He’s been launched straight into the Yellowjackets fandom, which has become television’s new plot theory launchpad. While the Season 2 finale answers who the next Antler Queen is, all the theories about Saracusa, sadly, were just those: theories. After doing an interview earlier in the season where he was peppered with questions about possible storylines, Reynolds says he started to research what was being said online. “Someone said maybe I was a descendant of Coach Ben’s boyfriend. I was like, ‘Oh, this would be juicy, and I wouldn’t put it past the show. A bunch of people wanted me dead. And I was like, ‘Oh man, they’re going to be so disappointed they had to kill poor Kevyn, who was just trying to be a nice guy.’”

The finale ends with Arthur (Elijah Wood) orchestrating an elaborate plot that makes it look like the now-deceased Kevyn is at fault for the death of Adam Martin, as well as that of Jessica (Rekha Sharma), the journalist who Misty (Christina Ricci) kills. As long as Saracusa keeps his mouth shut about everything that has gone down with him and the Sadecki family, Arthur won’t frame Saracusa instead of Kevyn—and it’s implied that Saracusa will do as much. Reynolds thinks that Kevyn being killed by Arthur in front of Saracusa is his character’s most important moment on the show.

“Saracusa, deep down, is a boy, and [this police work] is all pretend to him,” he says. “This was the first thing that really felt real. And he does have a loose moral compass, so I could also see them playing with that in the next season, and him playing along with this whole endeavor.”

It’s been a perfect role for Reynolds to explore a new era of his acting, because Yellowjackets combines some of the elements he likes most in his own comedy. Almost a decade ago, Reynolds made a parody video of the infamous Teen Witch “Top That” rap, where he edited himself into the scene, revealing his love for excavating silly men and weird nostalgia. So it’s no surprise that, for him, working with a cast that is a ’90s murderers row of talent, with Wood, Ricci, Melanie Lynskey, Lauren Ambrose, and Juliette Lewis is a dream come true.

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It was hard for him to not ask about some of his favorite films of theirs, but Reynolds managed to do it smoothly. “You fight the urge to be like, ‘What was The Faculty like?’” he says. “Even though I did literally do that to Elijah about The Ice Storm. I found a good way in. I was like, ‘Oh yeah, you've worked with Christina before…’

“They're just in all the iconic movies I grew up watching: But I'm a Cheerleader, Detroit Rock City. Can't Hardly Wait is one of my favorite movies of all time. Lauren Ambrose! They were great and complimentary. Melanie, in particular, was really good about inviting me to things, and I can’t thank them enough for that.”

While it’s unclear if we’ll get more Saracusa in Season 3 of Yellowjackets, Reynolds is hopeful that either we’ll get to see his comeuppance, or see him now in the pocket of the Sadecki family. Either way, Reynolds’ work confirms a theory that, certainly based on the characters he plays, men are in their flop era—but with a caveat. “I’m hesitant to define it as an era, because I feel like maybe they’ve always been there. But yeah, we're not doing too hot.”

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