All My Thoughts on the White Lotus Season 3 Finale

IT WAS THE SUBTLE NOD TO THE OC FOR ME

If you know me, you know I don’t watch reality TV. Instead, I put every ounce of my attention span—something I don’t have for anything else—into realistic, scripted television with a healthy combination of satire and drama. This is why I love The White Lotus. It has everything I love about TV. Great writing, perfect casting, excellent cinematography, fab settings, mystery, giggles, etc.

The first season was very good. The second season was even better.

Then came the third season.

I still think the third season was very good. If season two never happened, we would have had different, lower expectations. I mean, it had Italy, Jennifer Coolidge, Chrissy Moltisanti, Aubrey Plaza, ETC.

Regardless, season 3 hit different. It was more dramatic and less dramatic at the same time. There were a lot of characters and plotlines for an eight-episode season, with some I didn’t care about at all. I’m also pretty sure I read everything that happened in the finale in fan theory posts online.

Let’s dive in.

***SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!***

Rick and Chelsea

When I mentioned Ryan Atwood carrying a dying Marissa Cooper away from the fiery car crash that killed her in my last White Lotus post, I didn’t realize that they were LITERALLY GOING TO DO THIS!!! Like can you imagine if Hallelujah was playing in the background? My PTSD would have gotten PTSD!

Unlike The OC, though, I didn’t really care when Chelsea died. Or Rick.

Chelsea is an idiot. Rick literally shot and killed someone, and she took his hand and ran with him.

Rick is even more of an idiot. If he was really the son of some guy the hotel owner killed back in the day, hotel security would have been waiting for him to return from assaulting him to take him away. Instead, the man casually came up to him at the hotel breakfast, told him to leave, and showed him a gun—in a public place that he owns. They’re both idiots. Like father, like son, I guess!

This story had the most unanswered questions. Why did Rick have money? What did he do for a living? How did he know Frank? Why did Frank tell that story? FOR SHITS AND GIGGLES? Why did Frank do a somersault? I feel like we were made to believe that Rick and Frank were in the business of either killing people or drugs, but it’s not clear because they made some very poor and dumb choices that would not be made by people who made a lot of money from a successful, dangerous career.

The Ladies

I thought the girl’s trip had a perfect ending.

Laurie’s monologue was deep and made me nervous about my own future midlife crisis. Recognizing that you see your mistakes and bad choices in old friends because they were there when you made them is some profound shit.

A lot of their anger throughout the season seemed internalized based on how they felt they were being perceived or how they felt about their own lives. They each seemed to put up a fake front, and Laurie was real for admitting hers. That’s why it was so sad when she said, “I’m just happy to be at the table,” and Jaclyn and Kate looked at her like she was a lost puppy—even though they probably felt the same way, too.

Jaclyn is clearly lonely, insecure about aging, and desperate for friendship.

Kate seemed the most grounded, but that comment Laurie made about her husband being all over Jaclyn at their wedding made it seem like her whole personality could be a facade.

It’s a classic “the grass is greener on the other side” story. These women are jealous of each other for having what they don’t. For Laurie, it’s Jaclyn’s face and Kate’s faith. For Kate, it’s also Jaclyn’s face and Laurie’s independence. For Jaclyn, it’s Kate’s perfect family and Laurie’s confidence. If they had deeper conversations, maybe they would realize this. But the pretending keeps everything at the surface.

Laurie basically said that even though they’re not close, they’ll always be close because they went through so much together and know so much about each other’s pasts. This makes them more like sisters who aren’t super close rather than friends.

I feel like the three of them don’t have many friends, and it’s probably because they can’t stop talking shit lol. They think their dynamic is normal, and in some ways, it is! It’s just heavily exaggerated.

And I’m sure they’ll do it all again next year!

The Ratliffs

So I guess the theory that the dad’s lawyer fixed everything was wrong. We don’t know for sure, but it seemed as though the family was heading back to lose everything. After turning on their phones, Saxon and Piper exchanged a look that suggested they saw the news.

The journey to this point is where I found things very unrealistic. And I KNOW, it’s a TV show, but it's a satirical one built around truths about society.

Exaggerating truths to a point where they no longer seem realistic is fine, like Piper realizing she’s spoiled after sleeping on a stained and uncomfortable mattress for one night. This is me every time I stay at a hotel less than 5 stars:

But when things don’t make sense from the start, I get lost. Some examples:

1. The Phones

There is NO WAY that all five people in the Ratliff family, three of whom repeated numerous times throughout the season that they couldn’t live if they lost everything, would be able to last a week without their phones. Everyone is attached to their phones. They are what a drink is at a networking event to humans living life.

Saxon claimed to be so attached to work, but he could go a full WEEK without checking in? And Lochlan, a high school senior, who has probably used a phone every day of his life that he can remember, dropped it COLD TURKEY? Like I’m sure he’s addicted to porn. Maybe that’s why he settled for his brother. And Piper, a college student, gave up her connection to friends, music, and podcasts for a full week? I don’t buy it.

The dad also went from having an attachment to his phone to being okay without it because of anxiety pills??? I understand he was dealing with impending poverty and jail time, but it was very unrealistic (and boring tbh).

I mean, they were in a foreign country. He could have AT LEAST sold expensive items for cash and hid that cash for his family. Where’s the STRATEGY? Being overseas when this happened was a gift, and he fucking blew it.

2. The Apples

If you were on vacation with family and your dad wanted to go back to the hotel suite after dinner and make pina coladas in a blender for everyone, would you not LAUGH? No one was like why don’t we just order drinks at the bar? Or ORDER ALREADY MADE PINA COLADAS TO THE SUITE? This is not a family who does things themselves. Also, the kids didn’t want to go out after dinner for their last night?!

Saxon is the only one who seemed weirded out by the whole pina colada thing, but he drank it anyway (classic him). Perhaps this was just a metaphor for him always going along with shit he knows is weird (like his brother jerking him off lol).

The real metaphor for the entire family was that their privilege allowed them to ignore anything bad going on around them. None of them noticed the dad was spiraling and taking a million Lorazepams the entire trip, and none of them noticed or questioned the seeds in the blender. They about to notice things now though!!!

3. Lochlan’s Fake Death

Daddy Ratliff was panicked enough to throw a glass out of Saxon’s hand onto the ground and dump the other drinks down the drain, but he left the seeds in the blender overnight knowing his kids were using it every morning???? If you almost poisoned your family, wouldn’t you get rid of all of the poison after if you changed your mind?

Then, in the morning, Lochlan blissfully ignores the gross stuff in the blender and uses it to make a protein shake so he can be like his older brother, who he worships.

Both of these things were realistic to me because… men. But the poison part made it a LITTLE hard to believe.

I was so glad no one in that family died because it would have been too dark. However, don’t claim you didn’t have a moment of “whatever” after thinking Lochlan died because you thought it was gross that he jerked off his brother. We all justified his death, so that joke was on us.

The “people pleaser” lives on!!!

What happens to this family now?

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Belinda and Zion

Throughout the entire season, Belinda was paranoid and scared. Then Greg/Gary offered her money, and she was all like, “my morals! my morals! I can’t take the money!” Then, all of a sudden, her 20-something son negotiated a deal for $5 million, and she became a different person who had no morals and told Pornchai to go fuck himself (not literally).

This was a metaphor for the entire season. It was a realistic (and maybe not exaggerated) portrayal of how money can change your values and beliefs in an instant.

Right after we watched the Ratliff family sail away while learning they were about to go from rich to poor, it cut to Belinda and Zion, who just went from middle class to rich. Or at least I think they were middle class.

It seemed crazy that cheap Greg/Gary, who first offered Belinda $100,000, accepted their ask of $5,000,000 without negotiating. Like how did he take Zion seriously?

Greg/Gary conned a rich woman into marrying him so he could kill her and take her money. Yet he wired Belinda five million dollars because he’s scared of her and her son? Why can’t I ever get into a situation like this?

Anyway, I hope Belinda moved that money out of her checking account. It was giving ~LORAZEPAM~.

The Hotel Staff and Locals

This part of the season was very underwhelming. If some random guard who had no character development shot and killed Rick, I would have felt the same way as I did when Gaitok shot and killed him. His story with Mook was also irrelevant.

I was surprised the Russian guys ended up not being connected to the ending at all. At least they had a good time, I guess.

Last but not least… JUSTICE FOR PORNCHAI.

Hopes for Next Season and Beyond

People keep dying at The White Lotus properties. Imagine if this was happening in real life at Four Seasons hotels all over the world? It would be a Netflix documentary. Are they going to acknowledge this on the next season? It’s getting sus.

There’s a lot to hope for in the next season, but TBH, I’m really just hoping for the same thing I was after season 2 ended: a bachelorette party plot. I tweeted this back in 2022, and I’m bringing it back again now because we need this. We deserve this.

Someone send this to Mike White!!!

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