Yellowjackets star Steven Krueger on Coach Ben Scotts necessary mercy killing: The story needs this death to happen

While “Yellowjackets” stars and fans alike were sad to see Coach Ben Scott die in Season 3, Steven Krueger said his murder was “necessary” for the show’s future.Krueger, 35, who played the soccer team’s self-aware mentor, sat down with The Post to discuss his thoughts on his character’s death, revealing he knew Coach Ben’s fate long before they started filming the latest season.“They [the showrunners] said, ‘Hey, this season is going to be the end for Coach Ben,’ which I kind of had an inkling.

We had discussed it kind of informally at the very beginning of the show,” he explained to The Post.“So, I kind of knew Season 3 was like about the time range.”In Episode 6, viewers watched as teen Natalie (Sophie Thatcher) kills Coach Ben behind her teammates’ backs after the “Yellowjackets” turned on him.

The teens held him hostage and cut his Achilles tendon so he couldn’t escape after they found him guilty of burning down the cabin they were staying in following their plane crash.After repeatedly pleading with Natalie to end his life, she did, resulting in her being dethroned as the leader of the group.

Coach Ben’s corpse was then beheaded, cooked, and eaten by the group — poetic justice for his character, Krueger said.“This is really poetic.

It’s like a strong hero’s death in a way,” the star told The Post.“The second thing is, it’s really, really necessary because, truthfully, the rest of the story needs this death to happen for, like any of this, to continue.”Krueger shared that Coach Ben’s death was a “chain reaction” that ultimately “sets off everything else down the road.”He pointed to the frog scientists and their wilderness guide — Hanna (Ashley Sutton), Edwin (Nelson Franklin) and Kody (Joel McHale), respectively — being captured and two-thirds of them being brutally murdered after witnessing Coach Ben’s bloody head on a stake.“I don’t think that any of that would have taken place if...