It feels like the entire world has been tuned into this season of The White Lotus. The satirical anthology drama, set at the eponymous White Lotus Resort, takes place at a different vacation destination each season. Season 3 is set in luxurious Thailand and thematically focuses primarily on the western commodification of spirituality, boasting the tagline “Karma comes for everyone”.
The White Lotus is known for its darkly comic examination of tourism, colonialism, and class disparity, as well as its star-studded cast and quotable one-liners (Season 3 particularly on this front). Viewers have been on the edge of their seats for weeks on end waiting to find out just how karma will strike. Well, the finale is finally here, and there is a lot to unpack.
What’s Going on This Season (and What Are We Dying To Find Out?)
There are a few central groupings of new characters that are guests at the hotel: the incredibly concerning Ratliff family, father Timothy (Jason Isaacs), mother Victoria (Parker Posey), the eldest brother Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger), sister Piper (Sarah Catherine Hook), and youngest brother Lochlan (Sam Nivola); three complicated childhood friends who are traveling together, famous actress Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan), conservative Kate (Leslie Bibb), and sensible Laurie (Carrie Coon); a couple, grumpy Rick (Walton Goggins) and young cheerful Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood).
There is also a slew of White Lotus staff member characters, including struggling security guard Gaitok (Tayme Thapthimthong), Mook, Gaitok’s love interest (played by K-Pop superstar Lalisa Manobal), and Sritala (Lek Patravadi), the wealthy co-owner of the resort. Despite the show’s anthology status, there are two rollover characters from past seasons: Belinda (Natasha Rothwell), the spa manager at the Hawaii white lotus from Season 1, and Greg (Jon Gries), Tanya’s (Jennifer Coolidge) evil ex-husband from the first two seasons. The White Lotus is chock-full of action, so there are many more characters, but these are the key players in the most pressing plotlines going into the finale.
Speaking of which, we are all wondering, what is Timothy going to do about his embezzlement woes? Is he going to harm himself or his family? Will Rick return to Chelsea? What is going on between these incestuous siblings? Is the friendship between these three problematic women going to make it out of Thailand? And, of course, who, or how many people, will die? In the first episode, it was revealed that there would be a shooting of some kind, and the big mystery of the season is figuring out how we got there.
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Who Lives, Who Dies, and Who Gets What They Deserve?
The Ratliffs
As always with The White Lotus, there have been signs that this was how it was going to end all along. Beginning with the Ratliffs, they all (somehow) made it to the end of the season alive. Though it seemed at first that Timothy was going to murder his whole family with poisoned piña coladas, minus the virtuously spared Lochlan, he ultimately decided not to at the last minute.
It also seemed, however, that Lochlan might ironically bite the bullet anyway after drinking a protein shake with piña colada remnants. When Lochlan has his brush with death, he sees what he describes later as “God.” His vision, of course, involved him swimming upward toward what appeared to be four monks, only to give out before he reached the surface. This is precisely what the monks told Timothy happens when you die.
There are many possible ways to interpret this sequence as an ending to the Ratliff storyline, but it all revolves around Lochlan. Seeing as Lochlan was the only Ratliff sibling who said he could live “without,” he, of course, was the only one his father felt deserved or could bear to live post-Thailand. His deeply disturbing conversation with Saxon earlier in the episode revealed that Lochlan did, in fact, remember everything about the wild night they spent with Chloe. Lochlan says he is simply a “pleaser,” and he actually seemed to respond well to the night he spent at the meditation center with the monks.
As Lochlan lies, possibly dying, on the pool deck, his family does not even take notice. It is only when Timothy sees his youngest son, presumably dead, that he really realizes what he has done. All the Ratliffs leave the White Lotus fundamentally changed in some way (maybe not Victoria). The various meanings you draw from the Ratliffs may depend (strangely enough) on who you resonated most with, but the audience knows that they are about to have their lives fundamentally changed. Now, at least, Timothy has made peace with that fact. Life will go on.
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The Women
Laurie’s monologue, in which she seems to make peace with and somewhat forgive Jaclyn and Kate, will go down as one of the greats in television history. As the entire arc has been with these three, this seems to have simply been an exploration of complex female relationships. The entire season, we have seen them engage in gossip and jealousy, but also friendship. At the end of it all, though, they are childhood friends. Laurie is big enough to admit that her own sadness is what inspires that jealousy and most of their conflict. Because of this, they are able to enjoy a lovely last night together. Of course, they do end up in a scary situation the next day (but they seem ultimately fine).
Belinda and Zion
Belinda and her son had a sort of twisted happy ending. They negotiated their way to a nice little $5 million, but at what cost? The major shock here came when Belinda pulled a Tanya on Pornchai. Echoing Tanya’s dialogue from when she abandoned plans to help Belinda start her own spa in Season 1, the cycle of leaving people behind for advancement continues. This was particularly chilling coming from Belinda, who has been a symbol of moralism and hard work for the entire series.
Rick and Chelsea
Throughout the season, Chelsea warned she had a bad feeling about Rick going after his father’s killer. She said that “bad things come in threes.” Well, unfortunately, Rick and Chelsea were this season’s primary victims, along with the resort owner, Jim Hollinger, who is revealed upon his deathbed to actually be Rick’s father (in true Star Wars fashion). Chelsea also said that Rick was her soulmate, and that if anything bad happened to him, it happened to her, too.
These deaths are devastating, but they make complete sense in the context of the rest of the season. Karma struck, and Rick’s actions had immediate consequences. Plus, he did say that he wanted to kill the man who murdered his father. There is a beautiful symbolism in Rick and Chelsea floating together in the water, suggesting there may be some sort of connection between them beyond this life. Mike White said that the deaths and the way everything played out in Season 3 were a “classic theme of Greek tragedy: someone killing the thing they love while trying to get some revenge.”
Gaitok
The meek security guard Gaitok, who spent a large part of the season grappling with his spiritual beliefs in non-violence and how they conflicted with his job, is the one to eventually shoot and kill Rick at the insistence of Sritala. Now, because Gaitok has killed someone, he has moved up the ladder at The White Lotus after all. Assumingly, now he will get the girl, all because he, like Belinda, betrayed his moral belief system.
Wrapping Up
The last shots of The White Lotus Season 3 see all the guests ominously enjoying a serene boat ride back to their lives. They all ride off into the sunset, content looks on their faces, new horizons before them. All of this, of course, as if there was not just a complete bloodbath at the resort. This juxtaposition between the grim and sterile is typical of The White Lotus and brings home the show’s points, highlighting how wealth can shield people.
At the end of the day, no matter what may await them on the outside, all our remaining characters get to leave The White Lotus and Thailand behind them (or so we think). This season focused on the exploration of identity, and whether the guests will take their lessons with them or remain exactly the same people they always were, remains to be seen. Season 4 has already been announced, so it will be interesting to see if any characters pop back up for karmic retribution.
The White Lotus is now streaming on Max.
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