THIS POST CONTAINS spoilers for the Season Two finale of The White Lotus, which is streaming now on HBO Max.
“Arrivederci,” the finale of The White Lotus Season Two, was in some ways nothing like “Departures,” the conclusion to the primary season of Mike White’s acidic comedy about One Percenters run amok on trip.
Although each finales featured the demise of a central character — final yr it was Armond the contempt-filled resort supervisor, this time it’s Tanya the narcissistic heiress — and the bloody finish of Jennifer Coolidge’s character was performed far more for suspense than the Lotus worker’s excremental escapade within the Pineapple Suite. At occasions, “Arrivederci” bordered on Hitchcockian ranges of dread over the query of whether or not she was imagining issues, or if she was appropriate when she instructed the ship captain, “Please…these gays, they’re attempting to homicide me!” And the place “Departures” ended with the resort friends joyful and largely oblivious to the harm that they had inflicted upon the resort workers, Season Two’s closing picture was of lower-class friends Lucia and Mia celebrating their newfound fortune, a lot of it acquired from the rich however gullible Albie Di Grasso.
But in crucial means, the 2 closing chapters felt very a lot of a chunk. The place the episodes till now made for a largely disappointing sequel season, White on the finish managed to recreate the fragile mixture of tones and themes that had made the primary season so particular.
Begin with Tanya, who turned out to be one among a number of corpses promised within the season-opening flash-forward. Coolidge was maybe the most important revelation of the primary season, with White utilizing her acquainted hazy persona not solely within the service of comedy, however real emotion. In earlier episodes this yr, Tanya was performed nearly fully for laughs. As soon as “Departures” had revealed her obvious depths as affectations to be solid apart together with the folks she makes use of, there was merely nothing extra to be stated about her as a personality. She was again as a result of White clearly beloved writing for and directing Coolidge, and as an added hyperlink between the 2 seasons, however her scenes felt compulsory and fewer nuanced — and, worse, in addition they weren’t almost as humorous as she’d been in 2021. (The identical may very well be stated for Season Two as a complete.)
“Arrivederci” didn’t immediately restore Tanya’s complexity. If something, it despatched her out as much more of a joke, since she dies of a head damage after foolishly attempting to leap from Quentin’s yacht onto a dinghy, fairly than on the lookout for the ladder or stairs(*). However the air of actual hazard that White is ready to conjure up round her — and, maybe extra importantly, within the scenes the place Tanya’s beleaguered assistant Portia (Haley Lu Richardson) begins to concern for each their lives — compensates for that. At its finest, Season One discovered a technique to mock its horrible friends whereas additionally sympathizing with them on some stage. (Or, no less than, it made us perceive them.) In a similar way, this complete set-up, the place Quentin (Tom Hollander) and his friends are planning to homicide Tanya on behalf of her rubbish husband Greg as a means round his prenup, is type of ridiculous. (Why go to such elaborate lengths, and go away Portia as somebody who may inform the authorities that shady issues occurred involving a person who’s photographically linked to Quentin?) And there are moments in that story — not simply the immediately meme-able line in regards to the murderous gays, however Coolidge’s supply of, “Properly, he was kinda fuckin’ his uncle!” — which can be as hilarious as something White Lotus has ever performed.
(*) As Tanya’s physique first drifts underwater, White shoots her not in contrast to a signature picture from his earlier HBO collection, Enlightened, the place we noticed Laura Dern’s character having a life-changing expertise whereas swimming within the Pacific. Although Dern had cameoed on this season because the voice of Dom’s spouse on the cellphone, after we see him within the finale a picture of the entire household, his spouse appears nothing like Dern. Perhaps White is saving her for an even bigger, on-camera position in a future season?
But for essentially the most half, these scenes felt scary and nearly unbearably tense. That Tanya is ready to make like John Wick and gun down three of her would-be assassins ought to appear foolish. However White retains our POV fully on her terrified face — which is extra expressive in that second than it so usually appears when she’s floating via life — as she retains popping off rounds till she is lastly secure. Do a murder-for-hire plot and a burst of gun violence fully match the tone of this present? That’s arduous to say, even after two full seasons. However as a set piece, it was bravura in a means that a lot of this Sicilian jaunt had confirmed to be prior to now — concurrently a thriller parody and the real article.
Beforehand, Season Two was principally buoyed by the nightmarish {couples} getaway of Ethan (Will Sharpe), Harper (Aubrey Plaza), Cameron (Theo James), and Daphne (Meghann Fahy). The performances in that story have been so robust — significantly by Plaza and Fahy — and the motivations of all 4 members so slippery, that it felt engrossing even when different subplots have been floundering. It remained a spotlight within the finale, creating extra questions than solutions, however in a means that completely match the themes of that subplot in regards to the compromises that go into any relationship, even while you’re impossibly wealthy. By the tip, we have no idea for sure any of the next: 1.) Did Harper and Cameron really sleep collectively, as Ethan assumes, or simply kiss, as Harper insisted? 2.) If it was solely the kiss, would Harper have wished to sleep with Cameron if Ethan hadn’t knocked on the door when he did? 3.) Did Daphne and Ethan have revenge intercourse after he instructed her about his suspicions concerning their spouses? 4.) Is one among Daphne’s kids really the son of her private coach fairly than her philandering husband?
We will make cheap assumptions: the child appears far more just like the blonde coach than he does Theo; the appears Ethan and Daphne have been buying and selling alongside the isthmus weren’t these of individuals seeking to admire nature collectively. However the ambiguity made it extra attention-grabbing than if White had spelled all of it out(*). No matter occurred between Daphne and Ethan, the general expertise of the journey lastly pulled him out of sexual impartial, resulting in a passionate night time with the lonely and pissed off Harper. And Daphne and Cameron’s unstated agreements about their marriage — coupled with hints of pure sociopathy from Cameron — enable them to energy via infidelities, brawls within the Ionian Sea, and no matter different bumps they hit.
(*) It helps that Meghann Fahy was sending out sufficient warmth in that isthmus scene to soften a glacier, and in addition that she was capable of say a lot with the change of expression as Daphne absorbed what Ethan had simply instructed her. Only a improbable efficiency from Fahy, beforehand finest identified for Freeform’s The Daring Sort.
Daphne’s philosophy that “We by no means actually know what goes on in folks’s minds, of what they do” doesn’t actually apply to the season’s least profitable nook, concerning the poisonous masculinity of the Di Grasso males. Everybody behaves precisely as we might anticipate them to: Bert (F. Murray Abraham) proudly talks about how the household’s “Achilles Heel is an Achilles Cock.” Dom (Michael Imperioli) once more tries to recommit to his spouse, however can’t cease himself from gawking at a youthful girl on the airport. And Albie (Adam DiMarco) is simply too caught up in his Good Man fantasies to acknowledge that Lucia (Simona Tabasco) is scamming him. It’s all predictable and flat, with Abraham’s jubilant line deliveries offering that subplot’s solely actual life.
The place the resort workers final time round suffered badly (Armond worst of all), issues largely work out okay this time round. Lucia makes some huge cash — not simply from Albie, however from Cam lastly paying her what he owed. Mia (Beatrice Grannò) lands a everlasting job singing on the resort after having intercourse with Valentina (Sabrina Impacciatore). It’s a transactional relationship, but in addition one each events enter into overtly and fortunately, versus oily piano participant Giuseppe (Federico Scribiani) attempting to strain Mia into going to mattress with him in change for obscure guarantees bout serving to her profession. Valentina shatters the arduous shell she had constructed round herself, lastly sleeping with one other girl after a lonely and closeted life. It permits her to let go of her hopeless crush on Isabella (Eleonora Romandini) and invite Isabella’s boyfriend Rocco (Federico Ferrante) again to the entrance desk to work along with her.
In the meantime, there may be no less than some comeuppance for the non-servant characters. Quentin and two of his associates die, and whereas Greg could inherit Tanya’s fortune, the style by which she died was messy sufficient to warrant an additional investigation than if the killing had gone as deliberate. Albie loses 50,000 Euros of his father’s cash, which is sand off a seaside, however extra importantly will get his conception of self badly punctured. Even Cam doesn’t appear fully impervious to what has occurred on this journey, as he appears far much less joyful on the airport than the ex-roommate whom he had hoped to psychologically dominate as soon as once more.
It’s a satisfying inversion of how Season One functioned, and arguably a mandatory one, as it might be arduous to think about coming again to this present yr after yr if it was at all times going to be in regards to the friends blithely ruining the lives of the poorer folks round them.
However even a memorably violent and horny finale can’t fully cowl for the remainder of the season’s flaws. A 3rd season has already been introduced, and Cameron makes reference to taking his “associates” to the Maldives subsequent yr. Shifting previous Tanya will certainly assist, as White had nothing new to say about her, regardless of Coolidge’s comedian genius. Can White recapture Season One’s good stability of satire and pathos? And, if not, can his means to craft huge moments like Tanya on the yacht, or Daphne and Ethan’s lengthy stroll, be sufficient to make The White Lotus a vacation spot value revisiting time and again?
