'The White Lotus' Season Three Review: Strong but fell flat at the last moment

There will be spoilers of the third season in this post, so don't read on from this point if you're still wanting to watch or are in the process of watching The White Lotus.

Season three disappeared almost as soon as the HBO appeared in the first episode. Where it felt like the previous seasons took a bit longer to get through. I think some of this is due to the third season starting to feel a bit formulaic and all-too similar given the structure the show holds. It's not something that can constantly be original given the main premise: a group of elites attend a luxury resort chain named The White Lotus somewhere in the world, only to have their lives slowly crumble with reality checks as they realise the errors of their ways or get a nice punch in the head from karma itself. The first two seasons were pretty good: cinematic and beautiful, with stories that have you utterly despising the characters while also constantly guessing as to what's going to happen next. Usually setup with the fact that someone had died at the resort within the opening episode of the season. I quite like that setup, and the engaging feeling of having to figure things out slowly and trying to jump ahead of the show itself. But this is where season three starts to feel a bit like it's already getting stale: that setup can only be done in so many ways. There's only so many ways in which we can see these rich-type characters appearing and acting in similar ways, though with different names and stories. Much like many detective shows of the past getting stale.

Once you know how the episodes end, you're able to start guessing and figuring things out a bit earlier on. And the stuff in the middle seems a bit less interesting. This was the case with season three. It felt as if it was more an exposition dump that focused on a gradual increase of tension, repeating itself in a relatively effective way, but still not quite capturing that same feeling of mystery and excellence of the previous two seasons. With this introduction it's not to make claim that this was a bad season, in fact I thoroughly enjoyed it still. But I couldn't help but feel that due to its formula that it went in the wrong direction at the last moment, a few episodes previously focusing more on shock value and then quickly trying to come up with a bigger shocking twist to tie things up. Though there was a decent amount of character development within much of the characters that justified ending things a little earlier. With a few character stories that I found to be really good; primarily the Texan family and how they were focused on greed, with the father having already known that their entire fortune is to be lost the moment they return home. Ongoing investigations and clearly a few financial regulations broken being the primary cause of this. The slow descent into madness as he realises that his family claim to be incapable of living without the money they have. Him on the brink of both suicide but also murder-suicide in the assumption of saving his family from struggle.

I'll get into that side of things a little more later, but first I'll write a little more on the other engaging couple of the story: Rick and Chelsea with their troubled relationship. From the moment we see Rick, he's utterly miserable. Clearly depressed with some strong amounts of stress keeping him from enjoying anything, even despite Chelsea being so up-beat and caring. Their relationship seeming broken from the start, though made clear that Rick is fundamentally broken from his past, to which his father was killed and he believes the culprit is the owner of the hotel. Ready to seek out revenge and their presence in Thailand being just for that. Rick appearing like a total dick for the first few episodes created a powerful character that we ended up feeling for, given we quickly see that he's quite caring himself. Wanting to even save snakes at a circus by setting them free. A man that seems angry and tired but is quite harmless (beyond the intent to later kill a man). There was assumed closure later on when he finally meets the culprit and doesn't kill him, to which he seems finally at peace having confronted him and talked out his emotions. To which he returns to Chelsea and finally seems at peace enough to give her his attention once again. A total character shift. Though this is ruined with the episode's final moments in which he stumbles across the old man again, having his mother insulted, angering him again to the point of shooting him.

Oh, but here's that sudden twist! Killing him, his wife informs Rick that he is his son. Rick had just unknowingly shot and killed his father. Despite previous scenes showing this father being a horrible piece of shit to Rick and making no hints whatsoever about this fact. And then Rick and Chelsea are killed in a little gunfight with security. I think it would've been better to have given these two a nice ending, with Rick coming to terms with his past and finally realising something Chelsea had been talking about this whole season: the most important thing is their connection together, and being in the present. So let's move back to the Texans: with the father constantly stressing out over the loss of money and trying to pry into how his family could live without the money, he has this fear that none of them would want to live. His feelings of suicide are now wanting to save them from the struggles by celebrating their final night at the resort with drinks. Drinks he has put a poisonous seed into. The drama picks up nicely here, with him feeding them the drinks and suddenly realising how much he loves his family and can't go through with it, stopping them the first few gulps. Only for the one family member that said he'd be fine without money (and passing the suicide-murder test by not being given the drink) creates a morning drink from the same mixture still sitting in the blender.

I liked that from here the story shows the greatest punishment: the one family member that showed money meant nothing to him is the one to die. An emotional set of scenes that connects the show with these previous Buddhist ideologies on death and becoming one with the Earth again, becoming a droplet in the sea with the rest. Death is a concept that comes up quite a lot throughout this season: growing old and finding out what's most important to you. Letting the past go and focusing on the present. The inability to accept change. Even down to challenging yourself and your own values in life. To be free or to be another victim of ideologies that keep you down? What actually is freewill? I liked these themes throughout. So many aspects of life questioned, even down to the taking advantage of living in the moment and now taking it too literally will only result in false experiences that hold no true connection. A character of the rich Texans portrayed by Patrick Schwarzenegger, insufferable and fueled by greed and ego, only to realise nobody gives a shit about him. Only to discover his own shallow ways and that there's a greater world of emotion and interest out there. Foreshadowing being a discussion with his father on how he has nothing beyond the career his father had given him.

From a cinematography perspective this season was as strong as the previous ones. Nothing out of the ordinary for it. Still beautiful and takes advantage of the locations the season takes place in. Strong connections to the area, the culture and the ideologies of it all.