i really enjoyed nat in season 3. i spend a lot of time thinking about her character. she's meant to appeal to the audience in a way of seeming much more moral and grounded compared to the other girls, even if she doesn't see it herself. she takes on her guilt like it's a personal load consciously rather than subconsciously in a way none of the other surviving girls do and a defining part of her character has always been her moral compass.
however, a flaw i think is really interesting about nat in season 1 and 2 is that she's a lot of bark and no bite about her morals. she's willing to confront tai about her idea of freezing allie out, but doesn't go to their coach or jackie to try to stop the plan. nat's a scary type of bystander who knows what she's doing is wrong but doesn't take enough action to change it. this relates a lot to javi's death, where characters like van and misty are forthcoming about being grateful javi died, while nat is obviously extremely distressed by it, but was just as complicit in javi drowning. same thing with her apologizing to jackie's bones despite being there during the feast.
the only thing she is vocal about and also takes action on is lottie's wilderness beliefs (where she stages javi's bloody clothes) and that takes months for her to do (whether or not her doing that was actually moral or not is up to interpretation, but it follows nat's own belief that travis needs to mourn which is what's important). and in the end of s2 nat inadvertently sort of accepts lottie by her taking the position lottie and the "wilderness" assign her as leader. this goes with nat's perception of herself as worse than the other girls. she's completely aware of what she is doing, probably partially because she has already experienced intense trauma which already weakened her self worth, and also because she is used to feeling like she is in survival mode and the shift to it in the wilderness is less dramatic.
season 3 has a shift in nat. she doesn't take clear sides from episode 1. shauna and mari are constantly arguing and she gives them both the same punishment instead of telling them to knock off their specific behaviors that are instigating their fights the way tai suggests. nat hasn't had trouble telling shauna what she thinks of her since the pilot and it's pretty clear that shauna is the one making things go as far as they do when mari's worst crime until that point was namecalling and in s2 making a (genuinely) hurtful comment (that i do personally hold a grudge about even though i love mari) about jackie as they're getting ready to cremate her (though mari wasn't wrong in that argument. but that's beside the point). mari even calls nat out on giving her the same punishment as shauna when shauna was the one being a bitch about a game.
this comes to a head with the trial episode where she refuses to really take a side, but tries to do things that work in ben's favor by making misty his attorney and needing 2/3 majority, because even in the beginning of the episode i thought they would mostly vote him guilty. and then she kills ben silently. the final bit of natalie's quiet rebellion is her working on a covert plan to call for help, though i will say she is outspoken about them needing to find rescue (once rescue comes close, a lot of the relationships in the show shift, and nat becomes the most assertive we've seen with shauna since, honestly, the pilot. however, her silence here is from the same origin, of wanting to keep the peace in order to ensure their survival).
what's tragic about yellowjackets is that every character destroys their chance at what they actually need. shauna thinks that independence from jackie is what she wants until she's dead and it's obvious she just wanted jackie's validation. tai thinks she needs to continue to succeed and be logical like she always planned, not realizing that there are things she herself cannot explain and she needs to step back to take care of herself. misty craves community but in her desperate attempts to be valued she hurts everyone around her in the long run. nat is not the exception.
nat had no authority when she was using her voice. she wasn't as popular as the other girls and was ridiculed for her social life by jackie and tai. even in the wilderness as one of their two hunters she was seen as expendable enough to take part in the hunt. her constantly speaking out without doing anything to back it up didn't change anything.
once nat becomes leader her voice does have authority. her opinion has power over the hive simply because they see her as their queen bee. nat outright saying "we can't kill ben because we don't have indisputable evidence that he burned our shelter down" at the end of the trial honestly would have been enough to appease the majority of the girls, since the majority didn't vote for him to be guilty! but it's shauna who uses her voice to say her clear opinion, so they follow her instead.
i think shauna being able to keep them hostage instead of hiking for rescue was a domino effect of her knowing she can get away with swaying people towards her opinion from the trial. nat lost a lot of her credibility as a leader with that and her popularity by killing ben herself. shauna knows she has power which empowers her to take the gun, and it's gotten to her head enough that she's willing to shoot it.
there's no way to actually predict what shauna would have done in s3 if nat was more assertive. a main point of her arc in both timelines in this season is that she's acting irrationally angry as a trauma response. she probably would have pushed back harder, but nat was still at the top of the food chain. the followers like mari would have taken her side, and it might have been enough to deter the most drastic events from s3. maybe, maybe not.
i love nat because she shows there's no way to truly be moral and good in survival circumstances. she tries her absolutely wholehearted best to help herself and everyone around her as best as she can, but unfortunately you can't understand what's right until you can look back. she couldn't have known javi was alive when she faked his death to travis. she couldn't have known that 2/3 majority wasn't needed for her side to win. she was trying to strengthen the odds of the people she loved hurting the least possible.
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