Mike White, the writer-director of the hit HBO series The White Lotus, doesn’t want you to think it’s formulaic. In an April 2025 interview with Lacey Rose and Mikey O’Connell, The Hollywood Reporter wrote that he “bristl[ed] at the notion of any formula.” As the show’s creator, he has an incentive to distract viewers from its repetitiveness: each season starts with the death of a hotel guest before winding back the clock, prompting viewers to guess who, of several pampered vacationers, will die. However, amid a rotating mix of heiresses, spoiled rich kids, and get-rich-quick investors, thematically, The White Lotus never repeats itself.
The White Lotus starts fresh every season, with a new crop of guests arriving at a new location of the titular hotel. Conceived as a one-off production during the COVID-19 pandemic, in which the cast could film in a bubble, The White Lotus subverted both the circumstances of its characters and its initial viewership, implying the full range of human emotion can be felt in confined spaces.
Although it starts with a death, the series distinguishes itself as not a murder mystery. The White Lotus prepares the ultimate revelation of Who dies? to land with greater resonance by focusing on character development. Plot-focused as it may appear, the show wrestles with some difficult questions, differentiating itself from its genre peers on streaming services.
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The White Lotus‘ Mid-Life Monologue
With a few exceptions, the guests at The White Lotus don’t know each other, beginning and ending their journeys separately. One of Season 3’s most compelling storylines follows three women in their 40s who have been friends since childhood, jetting off to Thailand for a girl’s getaway: Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan), Kate (Leslie Bibb), and Laurie (Carrie Coon).
During their week-long vacation, alliances shift, grudges resurface, and new bonds are forged. After a feud, Laurie reminds her friends of their importance in each other’s lives, saying, “time gives [life] meaning.” She adds that Kate “has a beautiful life” and Jaclyn “has a beautiful face”, eschewing previous jealousy.
By addressing the trials of middle age, the monologue confronts the double standards women face when balancing a career and personal life, which the trio had weaponized against each other throughout the week. The hollow promises of capitalism also become clear: “Work was my religion, but I definitely lost my belief there,” Laurie says.
She also admits, “Being a mother, that didn’t save me.” By penning these lines, Mike White does not mean to imply that parenthood is not fulfilling. Instead, he uses these characters to point out that having children is marketed as a form of self-actualization to women more than it is to men, which leads people to look for things in motherhood that they will never find.
To conclude, Jaclyn says, “People judge me for my superficial defects. You guys judge me for my profound defects.” This observation channels the central message of The White Lotus: beneath a facade of glamour and wealth, people confront who they are. Although painful, this kind of self-interrogation can be rewarding.
Family Ties
A toxic trio also exists in another Season 3 storyline: the three siblings of the Ratliff family, wealthy Southern aristocrats. Traveling to Thailand, assuming that the middle child, Piper Ratcliff (Sarah Catherine Hook), is researching Buddhism for an undergraduate thesis, the family members’ relationships are tested by the vices available on vacation and the threat of losing their privilege.
Piper eventually reveals that “there is no thesis”. Instead, she lured the family to Thailand to check out the Buddhist monastery where she hopes to spend a gap year. This spiritual quest is the most normal of the siblings’ trials. Her brothers, the elder Saxon Ratclif (Patrick Schwarzenegger) and younger Lochlan Ratclif (Sam Nivola) take things too far when defining their versions of masculinity.
Referring to a mutually traumatizing event, Nivola told Brent Lang at Variety that the relationship between the fictional brothers is “irreparably damaged”. The divisive incident was during a three-way in which Lochlan became intimate with another hotel guest, Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon). He also helped satisfy his brother because he “looked a little left out”.
Yes, you read that right. In a March 2025 interview with Esther Zuckerman for GQ, Nivola justified his character’s misguided decision: “It’s a red herring…Lochlan just wants attention and his brother to like him.” Regardless of intention, a depiction of incest raises the question: at what point does playing with taboo become unethical?
To The Hollywood Reporter, the show’s producer, David Bernad, framed the scandal-making elements of The White Lotus as a “byproduct” of Mike White’s storytelling. However, salacious details also serve Bernard’s ends. Season 2 of The White Lotus portrayed sex between an uncle and his alleged nephew. While the pair turned out to be unrelated, incest is a clear motif in the show. Is this pattern a Freudian sexual liberation, or an acquiescence to viewers’ worst impulses?
Later in the series, Lochlan nearly dies after accidentally ingesting poisonous fruit. While he lingered between life and death, the phrase “twink death” trended on X, formerly Twitter. “Twink” is a term that originated in the gay community, referring to young men with a slim build. It has since expanded to encompass any youthful-looking male with a slender physique, regardless of sexuality.
In an article for GQ titled “How the Chaotic Twink Became the Archetype of the Moment”, media scholar Jonathan Corpus Ong is quoted as saying, “Society often projects its id onto the youth.” By making Lochlan sexually ambiguous, White uses him as a vessel for this process.
While providing shock value, the sexual act between brothers in The White Lotus highlights the show’s strong writing. In the first episode, in an attempt to usher his younger brother into manhood, Saxon tells him to “get laid” and asks, “What kind of porn do you like?” Mystified and fascinated, Lochlan idolizes his brother, assuming any sexually expressive act will earn his approval.
Indeed, the brothers capture the show’s defining quality: that character development is the plot. Because impending murder hangs over every episode, all personal upheavals bear potentially mortal consequences. Despite this, as the young Ratliff men face the consequences of reckless partying, they realize life’s most difficult trials conclude internally.
The White Lotus‘ Pernicious Plot
Physical plot points abound in The White Lotus. The poisonous fruit Lochlan consumes was left in a blender by his suicidal father, Tim Ratliff (Jason Isaacs), who made a lethal cocktail for himself and forgot about it. Variety wrote, “Who knew Chekov’s gun would be a protein shake?”
Season 3 also ties together threads from Seasons 1 and 2. While visiting Thailand, Belinda (Natasha Rothwell), an employee of Season 1’s Maui White Lotus, recognizes Greg (Jon Gries), husband of the late Tanya McQuoid (Jennifer Coolidge), traveling under the assumed name “Gary”. Using details from her brief friendship with Tanya, Belinda figures out that Greg killed the heiress and absconded to Thailand with her inheritance.
Although Belinda has a chance to expose this crime, Greg buys her silence. With a fresh $5 million to her name, Belinda bolts out of Thailand at the end of Season 3, deserting a potential business partner as Tanya had done to her in Season 1. Wealth makes people into their own worst enemies.
Season 3’s climactic death, of Rick (Walton Goggins) and his cheerful girlfriend Chelsea (Aimee Lou Reed), also bears irony. The two quarrel throughout their week in Thailand as Rick’s impulsiveness threatens their safety. Ultimately, he ensures their deaths by starting a gunfight where Chelsea gets caught in the crossfire. “We’re gonna be together forever,” she once told him. Tragically, this comes true.
The shoot-out also provides an opportunity for comedy. When the first shots are fired, the trio of 40-something women sprint in the opposite direction, a tangled mess of cover-ups and flip-flops. Their getaway highlights the absurdity of the scenario: a gang-style gunfight at a five-star resort. Piling onto the hyperbole, White borrows a plot twist from Star Wars when Rick finds out the man he killed to avenge his father was his father.
Leading up to these events, White lulls the viewer into complacency by exploring characters’ minds, so adrenaline-inducing action sequences bear the same weight as personal tumult. In the Season 3 finalé, a Buddhist monk speaks to this intention: “There is no resolution to life’s questions. It is easier to be patient once we finally accept that there is no resolution.”
Life Imitates Art: The White Lotus and Survivor
Before The White Lotus, Mike White participated in the reality-TV competition Survivor, a test of wilderness survival skills. Perhaps this experience informed The White Lotus: both examine how groups of people act when thrust into unfamiliar circumstances.
Similarly, the creation of The White Lotus took on this quality, as the cast lodged at the Thailand resort where they filmed, away from home for six months. Aimee Lou Wood told Time, “The distance is disappearing between fiction and reality because we’re living in the show. It’s all very meta.”
Isolation can yield shocking outcomes. After spending a night in a monastery, Piper Ratliff confesses her revelation of a no-frills lifestyle. She expresses guilt to her parents: “There’s so much suffering in the world and we have it so easy.” Piper’s observation speaks for all of the characters in The White Lotus, even those who would not recognize their circumstances. Although she becomes an avatar for the stereotypically superficial Western fascination with Eastern culture, the middle Ratliff sibling’s acknowledgment of privilege is more than her peers can accomplish.
Lochlan Ratliff also has a moment of clarity at the show’s conclusion. “I’m in a family of narcissists,” he says. His realization captures how a change of scenery can force a person to view their life differently. Throughout the series, Lochlan reckons with his people-pleasing nature, realizing he will never be able to gain a certain level of approval from his family.
The cast of The White Lotus attended two Full Moon Parties while in Thailand: one recreationally (also called “research” by Monaghan) and a second for the filming of Episode 5. To The Guardian, Jason Isaacs said, “It’s just grown-ups doing whatever we like. Thailand is a place full of parties, and we are not immune.” The show’s characters must reckon with the freedom of their privilege, like all adults must learn to harness the independence that comes with age. To not understand your power is to abuse it.
The White Lotus‘ Connections to Folklore
In the Ratliff’s hotel room are three monkey statues, representing the “Three Wise Monkeys” of Buddhist tradition: See No Evil, Hear No Evil, and Speak No Evil. Each sibling correlates to one of these entities: Saxon does not see anything wrong with his family’s lifestyle, Piper chooses to ignore the monk’s advice, and Lochlan has difficulty articulating his opinions. The show’s first shot of these characters captures this symbolism: Saxon wears sunglasses, Piper wears headphones, and Lochan covers his mouth with a drink.
In a similar shot at the series’ conclusion, Lochlan wears sunglasses because he does not want to face the consequences of his actions, Piper absorbs the glow of the sun because she has unburdened herself from the guilt of privilege, and Saxon reads a book, accessing his internality for the first time.
Their parents also learned some lessons. Tim Ratliff prepares to confess that he lost the family’s wealth in a money laundering scheme. The camera does not show the effect of this revelation on Victoria Ratliff (Parker Posey), the status-conscious matriarch, in keeping with The White Lotus tradition: one character completes a development arc within their ivory tower. In Season 2, Jennifer Coolidge’s Tanya asks, “Is Greg having an affair?” even after discovering that he, her husband, tried to have her killed.
Some people never overcome their internal obstacles: the instant gratification of denial is as temporarily rewarding as the pleasures of a five-star resort. The White Lotus is named for the Lotus Flower that first appeared in Greek mythology as a part of Homer’s The Odyssey. In one chapter of that epic, the voyage of Odysseus and his crew is derailed when they consume a plant that induces a state of euphoria. An entire life can slip away under its spell.
Like The Odyssey, The White Lotus is a parable for its times, warning viewers about the dangers of temptation. People will always be curious about what lies outside their immediate surroundings, whether or not such inquiries lead to good choices. In The Odyssey, Odysseus doesn’t return home for 20 years. While the vacationers at The White Lotus are only gone for only a week, it feels like a lifetime, if they ever return at all. With the world at your fingertips, it’s easy to pick the wrong flower.
Works Cited
Ang, Raymond. “How the Chaotic Twink Became the Archetype of the Moment.” GQ. 28 February 2025.
Berman, Judy and Campell, Charlie. “Behind the Scenes of The White Lotus’ Bigger, Wilder, Darker Third Season.” TIME. 24 January 2025.
Canfield, David. “How Mike White’s History With Survivor Unlocks The White Lotus.” Vanity Fair. 1 April 2025.
Edwards, Charlotte. “‘Sometimes, it’s Fabulous, Sometimes, It’s Lord of the Flies’: Behind the Scenes of The White Lotus Season 3.” The Guardian. 8 February 2025.
Haramis, Nick. “Welcome to the Age of the Twink.” The New York Times. 14 May 2018.
Lang, Brent. “Sam Nivola on ‘The White Lotus’ Finale, That Blender Scene and Lochlan’s Shattered Relationship with Saxon.” Variety. 6 April 2025.
Rose, Lacey and O’Connell, Mikey “The White Lotus Uncensored Oral History: Mike White and Cast spill Season 3’s Secrets.” The Hollywood Reporter. 7 April 2025.
Zuckerman, Esther. “The White Lotus: After Tonight’s Wild Episode, Sam Nivola Tells All.” GQ. 16 March 2025.