Ryan Kirksey
The following recap contains spoilers for The White Lotus S3E6, “Denials” (written and directed by Mike White)
With just two episodes left in Season 3 of The White Lotus, the conflicts on this show are starting to come clearer into focus. What will ultimately lead to a shootout on the grounds of the resort? We don’t know yet, especially since several of the guns in play in this show were removed from the resort’s grounds.
You may notice we have seen a lot less of the Thailand B-roll or of the monkeys that live on the resort grounds in the last two episodes. That’s because our pace is starting to pick up as we reach full throttle toward a disastrous chain of events at the resort.
While Episode 5 saw a lot of people enjoying themselves (at the expense of others) during the Full Moon Party, the aftermath of that night will help chart our path to the end of this season.
The Ratliff Family
Tim (Jason Isaacs) and Victoria (Parker Posey) are still trying to come to grips with the news that Piper (Sarah Catherine Hook) wants to move to Thailand for a year to live among Buddhist monks. They still think that what she is doing is asinine and that Christians like her shouldn’t want to do things like this.
If you think that’s something Christians shouldn’t do, Victoria, let me tell you about what your sons did last night! During a drug-fueled party on the boat, Saxon (Patrick Schwarzenegger) and Lochlan (Sam Nivola) found themselves in bed with the same woman. It was Lochlan, however, who lost his virginity while at the same time taking care of his brother in some incestual ways that only HBO shows can love.
Neither Saxon nor Lochlan can remember what happened the night before (at least they say they don’t), but this might be a defense mechanism meant to block out the memories of what happened. But once Saxon is reminded of what happened by other people who were there (more on that below), he essentially turns his back on Lochlan and doesn’t want anything to do with him. Saxon can’t be seen as someone who is anything less than ultra-masculine and engaging in some lovemaking with your brother doesn’t fit that mold.
With Saxon no longer taking Lochlan under his wing, that leaves the younger brother to accompany Piper to the temple, where her parents want to find out what’s going on with this “cult” and the monk once and for all. More importantly, as Victoria explains, “If that strange man is going to have my baby, he better be the best Buddhist in China!” Just give Parker Posey the Emmy now and be done with it.
Surprisingly, Tim connects with the monk after he assures the broken man that, “Everyone runs from pain to pleasure, but when they get there, only find more pain. You cannot outrun pain.” Will this sage advice help Tim stop having visions where he kills himself or his wife? Only time will tell.
Jaclyn, Kate, and Laurie
The morning after, Valentin makes his walk of shame out of Jaclyn’s (Michelle Monaghan) villa back to the resort, and Kate (Leslie Bibb) spots him leaving while speaking to her husband on the phone. Does Kate keep this information secret and talk to Jaclyn in private about it? Of course not. The literal first moment she sees Laurie (Carrie Coon), Kate tells her she saw Valentin leaving after sleeping in Jaclyn’s room.
This is because the roles of these three women (I don’t actually know if I would call them friends based on how they treat each other) are coming into plain view. Kate is the information hoarder and the gossiper, the one who has to know everything and be in the middle of all the conversations. Jaclyn is the one who has to have all eyeballs and attention on her, even as she ages and her profession will undeniably be something where that is harder and harder. Laurie is the nothing-ever-goes-my-way, woe-is-me member. She has fallen on some hard times, but she wants to now use that to her advantage.
Needless to say, this information spreading through the triad of ladies goes over like a lead balloon. Laurie accuses Jaclyn of always being like this (“You haven’t changed since the 10th grade”), Kate blames Laurie for telling Jaclyn she knew. And Jaclyn is now big sad because, “the few people I think I can trust are talking shit about me behind my back.”
Jaclyn, I wouldn’t be throwing any stones inside the doing things behind people’s backs glass house.
Chloe, Chelsea, and Gary
Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon) seems much less fazed about what she saw the Ratliff bros do the night before and is more concerned about the fact that Greg/Gary (Jon Gries) has deduced that she hooked up with one of them. He doesn’t need to know that it was actually both of them. Whoops, sorry Gary!
Gary doesn’t get angry, belligerent, or defensive. His response to this news is to ask Chloe to invite him to dinner that night. He needs help with some kind of plan and Chloe (and presumably the Saxon brothers, who might fear for their lives) would help.
Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) is still on the phone nonstop with her “soulmate” Rick (Walton Goggins), and is very concerned about bad things happening in threes. Presumably, she doesn’t mean the threesome that she thinks Gary wants to have with Saxon and Chloe. When Saxon presses Chelsea for a reason why she wouldn’t hook up with him the night before, her answer essentially demolishes him and his self-worth.
“Once you’ve connected with someone on a spiritual level, you can’t go back to cheap sex. Hooking up with you would be an empty experience….Because you’re soulless.”
We know Saxon’s entire existence is soulless and an empty experience. For someone Saxon fancied to tell him this might be worse than when Chloe and Chelsea reminded him his brother gave him a bit of a hand the night before.
Pornchai, Belinda, and Zion
As much as I want to assign blame to one of these three in the “son walks in on his mom with a stranger in her bed” fiasco, I don’t think the fault goes with any of them. I blame the White Lotus employee who opened the door up to the room without knocking, when the hotel clearly knows there is already a guest there.
Maybe take a quick scan around before you open the door to a guest’s room in the morning? Just a piece of helpful feedback for one of the most luxurious hotels in the world.
Anyway, Zion (Nicholas Duvernay) has arrived, which makes Belinda (Natasha Rothwell) happy (but probably not as happy as Pornchai made her). But right after his arrival, Belinda is presented with two strange offers. The first is Pornchai (Dom Hetrakul) suggesting he might want to help her achieve her dream of opening up her own spa. “It’s easy to do in Thailand,” he says. This sounds helpful enough, and Pornchai has been nothing but gentlemanly since he met Belinda. But we know that Belinda has experienced this before with heartbreaking results.
The other offer follows a jump-scare from Gary/Greg, who wants to invite her to the dinner party he is having that night at his house. If dinner doesn’t work, “last house, top of the hill” anytime she wants to talk. Not that Belinda needs any convincing to never go to that house not fully surrounded by a security detail, but anytime someone invites you to the “last house,” you should NEVER GO.
Rick and Frank
Rick and Frank (Sam Rockwell) had a mostly light lift in Episode 6. The episode-ending shot of Rick looking directly at Jim Hollinger (Scott Glenn) likely portends what is to be dramatic and violent in the next episode, but this story was a light appetizer for the heavy meal to come.
Still in Bangkok, Rick meets with Sritala (Lek Patravadi) and tries to lie his way through the story that his friend—a big Hollywood producer (does Sritala not know how to work Google?)—wants to meet up with her at her house to get a better sense of who she is personally, just so he can write a better part for her.
She agrees, which I can understand. Rick is appealing to her time as a young, beautiful actress and she wants to feel that way again (cough, Jaclyn, cough). Even if it means inviting strangers into her home where her sick husband is staying. That decision could end up being deadly, although Rick promises all he wants to do is talk to the guy.
I don’t know what makes less sense, the fact that Frank believed Rick wouldn’t bring the gun to the meeting, or the fact that Sritala’s bodyguards didn’t search two foreign strangers for weapons before allowing them to go into the house.
Most Likely to End Up Dead in the Water
I am going to go on record saying I think Gaitok’s retrieval of the gun from the Ratliff’s room is a red herring, and we still have something to worry about regarding how unhinged Tim is becoming. But I actually don’t think the visions he has in this episode come true. He won’t shoot himself and he won’t shoot Victoria and then turn the gun on himself.
As much as Tim may stand to lose once this vacation is over, I think you can make the case that Saxon has already lost everything that mattered to him. His dominion over his brother. His reputation as a ladies’ man and someone who can get anyone he wants. And his sense of self is next.
The scenes for next week’s episode show how Saxon says his job and reputation are everything to him. If he finds out his dad’s business is crumbling, and the macho bro veneer is cracking, what else is left? It’s not like Tim couldn’t go retrieve the gun again. Tim takes the gun back, but Saxon is the one who uses it on himself.
