Past seasons of The White Lotus tended to max out the cynicism. Belinda selling out fits that bill; ditto Gaitok. But there’s never been enough tonal room before for things like Rick and Chelsea’s grand doomed love affair and its over-the-top demise, or for feeling the kind of relief we feel when Lochlan lives, or letting Tim face his comeuppance with his head held more or less high, or the strange is-it-or-isn’t-it-a-resolution between the Three Ladies.
It’s amazing how much this opens up the show as a drama, and now that the season is over you can feel how its effects filter back all the way to the first episode. For the first time, it feels like these characters weren’t all funneled into the same “haha rich people are scumbags” destination. They were allowed to go their own ways, embrace or reject their own fates, for all the good it did them. Mike White’s lavish direction and Cristobel Tapia de Veer’s magnificent score make the show feel big — big images, big sounds, big ideas, big questions. The White Lotus now feels as vibrant and alive as the shots of the ocean and the jungle that served as its connective tissue, and as threatening.
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