The White Lotus wrapped up season 3 in the most tragic and dramatic way possible: Rick killed Jim without realizing he was his father, Chelsea was killed in the cross-fire of the resulting shootout, Rick was shot in the back by Gaitok, and Lochlan almost died from accidental poisoning. It was a lot! But apparently, there was more. Turns out The White Lotus producers filmed six alternate endings to the show in order to prevent leaks. Though, to be clear: they always knew how things were going to turn out.
“We have fake endings to the scripts,” executive producer David Bernad told People. “So we wrote up… we have six different endings and we kind of distributed fake endings to people just in case someone leaked anything, and then we could say there's different fake endings.”
“And then when we shot the ending scene, it's a locked down set,” he added. “So no one really has access to what we were shooting and there would be no non-White Lotus participants ever seeing what we're doing.”
On top of the show's explosive ending, The White Lotus team were closely guarding the secret of Jon Gries' return, as well as Sam Rockwell's casting. “Jon was really committed to keeping the secret,” Bernad said. “And when we were traveling and entered Thailand, he, one time, rode with the equipment in a bus, instead of flying the 45 minutes or whatever it was. I think he drove like, 12 hours from Phuket to Bangkok. But we were shooting at the Four Seasons, a scene with Jon Gries, and there were people looking and filming from a room. They didn't know that what they were filming was sensitive, and I was really scared they were going to post it. So I had the hotel manager go and bring them over to the set and I kind of schmoozed them and got them on my side.”
My biggest takeaway from this? I need to figure out where The White Lotus is filming season 4 and book myself a ticket.
Warning: spoilers for the White Lotus season three finale await. Every time Chelsea spoke about a blissful future with her wannabe hitman boyfriend – about their kismet bond and the importance of accepting one’s fate – it seemed increasingly implausible that she would leave the White Lotus resort in one piece. No one that wide-eyed and hopeful can survive in a Mike White mystery. Still, I don’t think many people predicted the level of bloodshed in the season three finale, which aired in the UK today.
A little recap: Rick spots Jim Hollinger, the man who killed his father, at the hotel. Any peace that he might have earned from sparing Hollinger’s life in the last episode was torn apart by the old man’s assertion that his mother was a "drunk", a “slut” and a “liar”. Rick begins to plot Hollinger’s death – ultimately stealing a gun from his jacket pocket and murdering him. Pow pow. A crossfire breaks out. Gunshots rip through the peaceful resort; guests and monkeys flee for safety. You can read the full recap here, but we’ll just give you a list of the characters who perished in the scene: Rick (killed by Gaitok), Chelsea, Jim (who, it turns out, is Rick’s real father), and two random bodyguards. It was all very brutal and dramatic, wasn't it?
The kind of traumatic experience that would stay with you for a very long time. Or at least, you know, an hour or so. But the guests at the White Lotus resort seem to get over it pretty quickly! The final montage begins with the Ratliff family, sitting down on the boat to the airport. Everyone's looking a little despondent, but what with all the incest and fraud and near-death experiences, you'd expect that.
Victoria, just one flight away from her lorazepam haul, is in much happier spirits, passing out the phones that had been taken during their digital detox. We didn't see any of them fleeing during the shoot-out, so there is a chance – however slim – that it basically passed them by. Fine. I'll accept it. But why is everyone else so utterly unbothered?
The camera switches to gal pals Jacklyn, Kate and Laurie, bittersweet smiles on their faces. They look like a group of friends who have strengthened their bond through hard times. They do not look like they've been caught in a bloody shoot-out, bodies floating lifelessly through the resort's once-tranquil waters.
Eventually we land on Gaitok, hugging Mook with big smiles on their faces, before he jumps into a car with the recently widowed Sritala Hollinger. By killing Rick and betraying his Buddhist principles, he has seemingly achieved his ambition of becoming a bodyguard. It's a big moment for him: he has won the respect of Mook and gained a massive promotion in the process. But he has also killed a man in cold blood. He has lost grip of his deeply rooted religious ethics in the most extreme way possible. You'd expect him to look a little conflicted, to say the least.
We only get a brief glimpse of Sritala through the backseat window, but she basically looks... fine? As the body bags roll towards a plane, the camera switches to spa manager Belinda and her son, Zion, speeding away on a boat. They are grinning from ear-to-ear, five million dollars richer, waving back to the island's staff – including Pornchai, the man she ultimately betrayed. They were going to start a spa venture together, but Belinda is now set for life.
The look of peace on Belinda's face as she rips across the gulf of Thailand proves that she wasn't so different to heiress Tanya McQuoid-Hunt, who did the same thing to her in season one (Belinda even repeated Tanya's break-up line: “I just really can’t commit to anything right now”). The point being: even the most principled of characters are powerless to money's corrupting influence. It's a nice way to tie the three seasons together, no doubt.
But let's remember: just a few hours ago, Zion's meditation session had been interrupted by a bullet shattering the glass window a metre from his head. The commotion sent him wading into the water as gunshots and screams rang out. He happened upon a sacred statue and took the opportunity to pray that his mum is okay. Then he saw it: a dead body, floating in the near-distance. I'd still be a little bit shaken up, is all I'm saying – even with five million dollars in the bank.
I would not, I'm fairly sure, be able to muster a "wooh". I'm not the only one who was left slightly baffled by the disconnect. Over on the White Lotus's dedicated Reddit forum, user Daltire asks: "Why are they all just casually smiling leaving the resort chitchatting as if a mass shooting did not just happen killing at least five people?" Another user, 'gryphonlord', responded: "Zion fully saw a dead body and ten minutes later he's just :D :D :D".
But then, no one has ever wired me five million dollars. Who knows what that does to your trauma threshold? Maybe we should just be grateful to Mike White for a very good season of TV. And as 'alliecat1798' wisely says: "I’m glad that Tim didn’t murder suicide his entire family at least". Take a look at our full recap here. And see you at the next resort, wherever that might be.
