The White Lotus Season 2 Finale: Sex, Lies, and a Hail of Bullets.
The second season finale of HBO’s popular Sicily-set series The White Lotus, featured tearful admissions, costly frauds, and a number of dead bodies. Salute to Aubrey Plaza.
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IF THERE IS ONE undeniable fact, it is that Yale produces some of the worst people on the earth. Cameron (Theo James) is the lecherous creep haunting Sicily’s Four Seasons Taormina in Season Two of The White Lotus. That intellectual revelation is arguably the least startling in the nerve-wracking HBO limited series finale, which saw not two, but four of these wretched rich bastards die.
Warning: Spoilers will follow
The film begins with Ethan (Will Sharpe) in full-on Othello mode, tortured by visions of his wife Harper (Aubrey Plaza) and his chum Cameron having passionate sex in their hotel suite, as the upscale scammer Quentin (a delectable Tom Hollander) phrases it. Ethan confronts Harper in their bed after she calls him “an idiot” over breakfast, a well-deserved jab if ever there was one. He accuses his unfulfilled spouse of having sex with his decade-long underminer. She admits to kissing Cameron in the room after he shut the door, but nothing else.
“I’m not even attracted to him, OK? He’s disgusting… It was a drunk, dumb nothing!” she exclaims, adding, “And the real issue is, you’re not attracted to me anyway!”
Of course, she’s correct. Whatever shenanigans the couple has gotten themselves into in Taormina, from molly and escorts to that hotel-room tryst, pale in compared to their core problem: Ethan and Harper are lacking in desire, which is aggravated by their unwillingness to be honest with one another about what they require. Heck, they might not even be compatible. Plaza, for her part, has done an excellent job of depicting what it’s like to be unwelcome, and how that sense of emotional humiliation may lead to paranoia and despair. An Emmy nomination is possible.
Ethan attacks Cameron, venting years of rage with a strong right hook, and confides in Daphne as a result of her revelation (Meghann Fahy). Fahy’s expression when Ethan tells her exactly what’s on his mind is heartbreaking, and it’s the work of an actress who has entirely lost herself in a role. Fahy’s turn has been the most understatedly magnificent of all the privileged guests this season.
“You don’t have to know everything to love someone,” she offers. “A little mystery… it’s kind of sexy.”
It’s unclear whether she and Ethan did the deed atop that hill, but his return to San Domenico Palace finds him energised and eager to bang his wife. And that’s a good thing. Ethan’s refusal to bed Aubrey Plaza’s looks-serving vixen has been one of the more improbable aspects of Mike White’s series this season. This hectic vacation, and Cameron and Daphne’s intervention, appears to have benefitted these two more than they’d care to acknowledge. More importantly, Valentina and Harper got hitched! Bravissimo.
Nothing much happens with the Di Grassos, except for our naive white knight Albie (Adam DiMarco) demanding his father (Michael Imperioli) transfer him 50,000 Euros—”a karmic payment… for all the shit you’ve done”—to pay the escort Lucia (Simona Tabasco) because she rode him like Seabiscuit, in exchange for Albie putting in a good word with his est The ungentlemanly arrangement leads to Albie being duped by Lucia, whose pimp dramatics were clear from the start.
Tanya (Jennifer Coolidge) and Portia are the only survivors (Haley Lu Richardson). As she looks at their framed Brokeback Mountain-style portrait, the former is slowly, painfully piecing together that Quentin and her estranged husband Greg (Jon Gries) are want her riches. “Please…,” screamed Coolidge. “These gays are attempting to murder me!” is going to become a meme. By the way, where the hell is Greg? Perhaps Season Three will provide a solution to that topic.
Meanwhile, Portia is slowly, agonisingly piecing together the reality that her teary Essex lover Jack (Leo Woodall) is nothing more than Quentin’s rent-boy henchman. Her eye for deception appears to be as feeble as her eye for fashion. At least Jack had the decency to drop her off near the airport rather than wherever Quentin instructed him to drop her off.
Tanya initially tells Portia that her prenup with Greg entitles him to all of her riches if she dies, and then locks herself in a bedroom aboard Quentin’s yacht. The affluent heiress then channels her inner Scarface, shooting her way out of the pickle and killing Quentin and his two companions. She slides off the railing, bangs her head on the side of the dinghy, and slowly descends to the bottom of the water, just as you believe she’s made it to safety. The next morning, Daphne discovers her body floating in the ocean.
We’re left with a scene at the airport in which the Di Grasso men all look at the same attractive young Italian woman; Daphne and Cameron exchange a knowing kiss; and Harper and Ethan finally appear to be on the same page as they hold each other close and crack the same smile. While our hero-escorts Lucia and Mia (Beatrice Granno) stroll off into the sunset, Portia gives Albie her phone number.
The fact that series creator Mike White was able to not only create a second season of The White Lotus a year and a half after the first one premiered, but to outperform it by tackling more complex topics like desire, intimacy, and fidelity with grace and a surplus of style, is a testament to his ingenuity. Season Three may be set in Asia, according to rumours. I, for one, am impatient.
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